I' ¦¦.<•: f,ji' P,c fr,u>.dA.ng;e£:Or College inj/y0£!ileti.yr e ILHIBISJMr ° DIVINITY SCHOOL TROWBRIDGE LIBRARY GIFT OF Professor Benjamin W, Bacon THE BELOVED DISCIPLE Works by the Rev. Principal A. E. GARVIE, M.A., D.D. STUDIES IN THE INNER LIFE OF JESUS THE CHRISTIAN CERTAINTY AND THE MODERN PERPLEXITY STUDIES OF PAUL AND HIS GOSPEL THE PURPOSE OF GOD IN CHRIST THE MISSIONARY OBLIGATION IN THE LIGHT OF MODERN THOUGHT HODDER AND STOUGHTON LTD. PUBLISHERS LONDON, E.C. 4 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE STUDIES OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL BY ALFRED E. GARVIE M.A. (Oxon.), D.D. (Glas.) principal of hackney AND NEW COLLEGES, LONDON HODDER AND STOUGHTON LIMITED LONDON Printed in Great Britain by T. and A. Cosstable Ltd. at the Edinburgh University Press TO THE SACEED MEMOEY AND BLESSED PEESENCE OF A WIFE BELOVED PREFACE In dealing with the subject of Christology the writer has been forced again and again to face the Problem of the Fourth Gospel. Tentative solutions have been accepted, but at last a solution has been reached which for the writer at least is as satisfactory as probably the difficulties of the problem will allow. This he ventures now to submit to the judgment of readers, as he has read enough and thought enough on the subject to entitle him at least to offer an opinion, however modestly and diffidently, and not to be con tent with saying Yea or Nay to the views of others. While other theories are referred to when necessary, the main endeavour is to gather from the Gospel itself the indications it offers regarding the mode of composition, the characteristics, the purpose and the authorship of the Gospel. Two series of articles in The Expositor form the basis of this volume, and the writer is grateful to the editor for permission to use this material. But the whole volume has been rewritten. ALFRED E. GARVIE. New College, London, June 30th, 1922. TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE vii xiiixiiixxi Preface ...... Introduction — (1) The. Problem (2) Various Theories .... (3) Solution Offered .... Bibliography xxiii Analysis of the Fourth Gospel xxvii I The Prologue. John i. 1-18 .... (1) The Twofold Interest (2) Possible Displacements (3) The Witness or the Evangelist (4) Influence of Philo .... (5) Influence of the Doctrine of the Logos in the Gospel (6) The Possibility of Palestinian Origin (7) Contrast with Philo .... (8) Teaching about Pre-esistence . 568 11 II Comments by the Evangelist 14 (1) The Fulfilment of Prophecy: ii. 17, xii. 15, 38-41, xv. 25, xiii. 18, xix. 24, 36-37, xvii. 12, xix. 28 15 (2) Meaning of Misunderstood Sayings: ii. 21-22, vii. 38-39, viii. 27 16 (3) Theological Interpretations: v. 18c, ii. 24-25, i. 48, iv. 18, iv. 44, xviii. 4, 8-9, xiii. 1-3 . . 16 (4) Explanations put on Lips of Jesus: xi. 41, xiii. 19, xiv. 29 18 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE PAGE (5) Other Unclassified Comments: xvii. 3, xi. 51-52, xviii. 32 19 (6) Longer Passages due to Evangelist(or Witness ?) iii. 31-36, v. 19-29 (7) General Influence of the Tendency (8) The Theology of the Gospel and of the Johan nine Epistles (9) Caution in the Use of the Fourth Gospel . (10) The Representation of the Glory of the only- begotten Son 20 25 26 27 28 III The Appendix. John xxi 30 (1) The First Part (1-14) . . . . 31 (2) The Second Part (15-19) 32 (3) The Third Part (20-23) 34 (4) Stanton and Bacon on the Authorship of the Appendix 36 IV The Redactor's Insertions 38 (1) The Attestation of xix. 35 .... 39 »• (2) The Petrine References : xviii. 15-18 (or 17-18), 25-27, xiii. 36-38, vi. 66-71, vi. 60-65 ... 39 (3) The Ministry in Galilee, vi. 1-59 ... 43 (4) The Second Visit to Cana, iv. 43-54 (?) . . 54 (5) The Interview with the Greeks, xii. 20-36 . 56 (6) Other Passages ascribed by Bacon to the Re dactor: iii. 1-21, ii. 23-25, iii. 31-36, xii. 44-50 . 59 The Reminiscences and Reflexions of the Witness : Introductory .61 (1) The Evangelist and the Witness's Reminiscences and Reflexions (51 TABLE OP CONTENTS xi PAGE (2) The Course of the Ministry of Jesus . . 61 (3) The Plan of the Record : Testimony, Judgment, Glory 65 (4) The Historicity of the Record ... 67 (5) The Growth of the Gospel .... 74 VI The Testimony. John i. 19-iv. 42 . (1) The First Testimony of the Baptist, i. 19-34 (2) The Call of the First Disciples, i. 35-51 (3) The Marriage at Cana of Galilee, ii. 1-12 (4) The Second Testimony of the Baptist, iii. 22-30 84 (5) The FntsT Visit to Jerusalem, ii. 13-25 (6) The Interview with Nicodemus, iii. 1-21 (7) The Journey through Samaria, iv. 1-42 78788082 85 88 94 VII The Judgment. John v., vii.-xi 100 (1) The Controversy at the Feast of Pentecost, v., and vii. 15-24 100 (2) The Controversy at the Feast of Tabernacles, vii. 1-14, 25-52, viii. 12-59 . . . .106 (3) The Controversy at the Feast of Dedication, ix. and x. . . . . . . . • 118 (4) The Raising of Lazarus and its Results, xi. . 124 VIII The Glory. John xii.-xx 140 (1) The Week before the Passion, xii. . . . 140 (2) The Upper Room, xiii.-xvii. . . . .144 (3) The Arrest, the Trials, and the Crucifixion, xviii., xix. ....... 169 (4) The Resurrection, xx 182 IX The Jesus Christ of the Fourth Gospel . . .194 sn THE BELOVED DISCIPLE The Authorship of the Gospel (1) ' The Disciple whom Jesus loved ' (2) The External Evidence . (3) The Internal Evidence (4) Characteristics of the Gospel . (5) ' The Aramaic Origin of the Fourth Gospel PAGE 202 202 204 221 239250 Index — (1) General 259 (2) Scripture References 262 INTRODUCTION (1) A comparison of Bishop B. E. Westcott's Com mentary x and Dr. E. F. Scott's exposition of the teaching of the Fourth Gospel 2 at once forces on us the question : how can two so fully qualified scholars be led to so different conclusions regarding the same book ? Each is weak in that he does not give heed to what in the Gospel gives strength to the position of the other. The book is a Janus-like reality ; it is history and doctrine, fact and idea, reminiscence and reflexion. There are signs of an eye-witness in the familiarity shown with local and temporal details ; there is a personal response of human faith to the divine grace as revealed in Jesus Christ ; Christian experience finds itself more at home in the Fourth Gospel than in any other. These are all supports of Bishop Westcott's position. The Prologue shows a speculative rather than a historical interest ; the peculiarities of the Johannine Epistles are reproduced in thought as well as language ; the manner and method of teaching assigned in the Fourth Gospel to Jesus is very unlike the presentation in the Synoptic Gospels. These features of the Gospel lend counten ance to the contention of Dr. Scott. (2) A solution of the problem has been sought in ' partition ' theories in which a more or less historical source has been separated from additions or modifica- 1 The Gospel according to St. John. ! The Fourth Gospel : its Purpose and Theology. xiii xiv THE BELOVED DISCIPLE tions made by an editor, influenced more or less by a doctrinal interest. The main difference in these theories is in regard to the comparative historical value to be assigned to the discourses or the narratives. (i) H. H. Wendt x uses as his clue ' the difference between the point of view of the Evangelist and that of the discourses of Jesus ' in respect of the purpose of the miracles ; and reaches the conclusion that ' the source contained discourses and conversations of Jesus,' and ' does not seem to have included any piece of purely narrative character.' Such a principle of partition seems to be arbitrarily imposed on the Gospel. From this standpoint he offers a detailed analysis of the source-components of the Gospel. (ii) Mr. J. M. Thompson, in an article on ' The struc ture of the Fourth Gospel,' 2 calls for ' a recognition of the dual nature of the Gospel, a reconsideration of internal rather than external marks of different points of view, and an attempt to distinguish in broad outline the parts of the Gospel which express each of these divergent tendencies.' The two standpoints are represented by the Prologue (i. 1-18) and the two passages (xii. 36-43 and xx. 30-31) which may originally have formed one conclusion. ' The conclusion assumes that the chief work of Jesus was to do miracles (ar]/j,eia, signs), and that the main object of the Gospel was to describe them : that the miracles were meant to rouse belief in Jesus as the Jewish Messiah : and that those who believed in Him would obtain that eternal life which was the goal of their apocalyptic hopes.' The difference from the Prologue is evident. ' The dual point of view regards the Prologue as the Preface to the discourses 1 The Gospel according to St. John : an Inquiry into its Genesis and Historical Value, p. 166. 2 The Expositor, 8th series, vol. x. pp. 512- 14. INTRODUCTION xv of the Gospel, and the Conclusion as the summary of its narrative portions.' He admits that ' all attempts to carry out a detailed partition of the Gospel on these lines have broken down. But it does not follow that the hypothesis, in its main outlines, is incorrect.' The discussion is continued in another article on ' The Composition of the Fourth Gospel.' x The view here taken of the relation of the Prologue to the Gospel is not accepted in this volume, and the theory therefore need not be further discussed. (iii) Dr.R. H. Strachan suggests another hypothesis,2 which he states ' rests on the position that in the Gospel as it stands there are apparently two disparate plans of construction. On the one, the incidents and dis courses of the Gospel are grouped according to what might be called an ideal plan, in which the narratives and discourses not only in themselves reflect ideas about the Person of Jesus, but are grouped in order to illustrate certain aspects of faith in Him. This is the plan that governs the form and arrangement of what may be called the Johannine material (J). Another plan has been superimposed on this, a chronological one, which has for its object to give a historically connected form to the Gospel. Its author may be denominated R. The aim of R may be con ceived as an attempt to produce a Gospel which shall be more in harmony with that biographical and chrono logical form which to him is consonant with a gospel. Whether R is synonymous with the author of the Appendix (ch. xxi.) is a matter for further discussion.' In his small volume on The Fourth Gospel 3 he gives 1 Op. cit. xi. pp. 34 ff. 1 < Is the Fourth Gospel a Literary Unity ? ' The Expository Times, xxvii. pp. 22 ff. s The Fourth Gospel : its Significance and Environment, xvi THE BELOVED DISCIPLE an analysis of the Gospel 1 ' based on the supposed ideal plan alone, and for the moment the R passages are left out of account.' He adds 2 a list of the passages which he assigns to R. ' Opinion may differ here and there as to the reasonableness of the division adopted ; but work of this kind must always remain more or less tentative. It is to be carefully noted that all notes of time and place in the Gospel are not to be referred to B. Many of these are marks of an eye-witness, almost unconsciously introduced, and are to be distinguished from those cases where either a statement of time or place, a connection of thought, or a piece of narrative has been introduced to give chronological unity to a writing whose original basis of construction was a sequence of ideas.' The passages ascribed to R are ii. 1, 12, 23-25 ; iv. 1-3, 43-46a ; vi. 1, 2, 6, 15, 23 ; vii. 1, 10 ; x. 40-42 ; xi. 2, 17, 19, 30, 31, 38, 46 ; xii. 1& (when Lazarus was . . . from the dead), 9-11, 17, 18 ; xx. 2-10, 24-29. If, as the writer himself believes, and will try to prove, the historical framework of the Gospel came for the most part from an eye-witness, any reason for assigning it as a whole to a later redactor disappears, although the hypothesis of a redactor, and of chronological notes added by him, need not be initially set aside, but may, when necessary, be subse quently referred to. (iv) Dr. B. W. Bacon 3 assigns to the Redactor (R) the Appendix (xxi. 1-24), the intention of which is to identify the author of the Epistles and the Gospel, the nameless ' Elder,' with ' the disciple whom Jesus loved.' 4 An additional reason for assigning to R other passages in the Gospel itself are the displacements which break 1 Op. cit. pp. 55-59. 2 Op. cit. pp. 59-60. 3 The Fourth Gospel in Research and Debate. * Op. cit. p. 193. INTRODUCTION xvii the continuity of the narrative of the Gospels. ' In every case these displacements occur in conjunction with passages which by their direct connection with the Appendix, or otherwise, give independent evidence of having been introduced by R.' x These passages are the Purging of the Temple (ii. 13-25), the Interview with Nicodemus (iii. 1-21), the Supplement to the Baptist's discourse (iii. 31-36), the Feeding of the Five Thousand (vi.), Peter's boast (xiii. 36-38), Peter's denial (xviii. 12-27). There are also ' parenthetic additions' such as xix. 35. This Redactor was, accord ing to Bacon, ' a contemporary of Papias, Polycarp, and Justin, probably a Roman ' ; and his intention in his additions was to adjust ' the Asiatic or Pauline tradition to the Petrine of Syria and Rome.' 2 In the analysis which the "writer will offer, he will have frequent occasion to return to the views of Bacon. (v) While it is true, as Dr. Strachan in the first sentence of his article maintains, that ' the question of the literary unity of the Fourth Gospel can no longer be summarily dismissed, under Strauss' figure of the seamless robe,' yet the Gospel is on the whole too organic in structure to allow much probability to hypotheses of partition, although insertions in the original structure of the Gospel associated partly with the Prologue and partly with the Appendix must be recognized. In the carrying out of these there are not, as in the Two Document Theory of the Synoptic Gospels, three distinct works for comparison of the treatment of the sources by the editor ; but each critic must set up a criterion of his own, often of doubtful validity, to determine what does and what does not belongto the source.3 Whilesuch hypotheses are at first 1 Op. cit. p. 523. 2 Op. cit. p. 454. 3 The Prologue and the Appendix do afford criteria, as will after wards be shown. b xviii THE BELOVED DISCIPLE sight attractive, closer scrutiny proves them unsatisfac tory in the degree in which they apply one hypothesis too rigidly. We must look rather for a vital develop ment than a mechanical structure in the Gospel. (vi) Dr. Percy Gardner conceives the process of composition of the Gospel as follows : ' The Evan gelist is primarily positive, not negative ; he writes from the abundance of the heart, not in a critical vein. In many of the cases in which he is supposed to be correcting Matthew or Luke, I think he is only trans posing into his own key the traditional narrative. It is likely that, when he wrote, the Gospels were current at Ephesus. He had doubtless often heard parts of them read. He was not satisfied with them, because he thought that the view which they took of the person and sayings of Jesus was literal and materialist. Sometimes he was able to correct or supplement them in details, by the help of oral traditions which had come down to him from a particular source. More often he preferred to narrate tales which they had omitted. But, in every case, he transmuted everything in the light which came to him from the experience of the Church, and from the personal revelation which he, like St. Paul, supposed himself to have received from the exalted Head of the Church. . . . The Evangelist had a source of information derived from the teaching of one of the Apostles, whether he himself had listened to him, or had only been a hearer of some of those who repeated his words.' 1 ' The Gospel, in spite of its majesty of style, and high unity of thought, is from a critical point of view a tangled skein. We have the greatest difficulty in separating in it what comes from tradition, what belongs to the experience of the Church, and what is added in 1 The Ephesian Gospel, pp. 66-67. INTRODUCTION xix the way of comment and background by the Evangelist himself. That the Gospel is divinely inspired I strongly hold, and especially inspired in being adapted to further high Christian thought in ways which the writer only dimly foresaw. But inspiration does not work by giving the inspired man a direct knowledge of events which have happened in the world ; that is not the character of inspiration. He may be careless of fact, or misled by incorrect information, nor is he in any way infallible ; but he is an exponent of the life of the Spirit under the forms of his own age.' * While, as the sequel will show, not agreeing with Dr. Gardner in details, the writer heartily welcomes his testimony to the value of the Gospel for Christian thought and life and his recognition of the complexity of the structure of the Gospel. (vii) Dr. V. N. Stanton 2 distinguishes the evangelist who wrote the Gospel from the witness on whose teach ing he depended for most of his material. He still, but not very confidently, identifies the witness with John the son of Zebedee ; the evangelist, he maintains, may also have been a Jew of Palestine who as a boy had seen and heard Jesus, and who removed to Asia as a lad or young man before John did. ' For the fact that John the son of Zebedee lived and taught in Asia in his latter years the reminiscences of Irenaeus of what he had heard in his youth from his elders, and the general tradition of the Church in the latter part of the second century may be thoroughly trusted, because this would be matter of common knowledge, about which it would have been exceedingly difficult for an error to arise and to hold its ground ; all the more 1 Op. cit. pp. 122-23. * The Gospels as Historical Documents, part iii., The Fourth Gospel. xx THE BELOVED DISCIPLE so in this case because there were those whose interest it would have served to have cast doubt upon it in a bitter controversy at a time when it would not have been too late to call it in question. But the authorship of the Fourth Gospel by the Apostle John, though included in the second-century tradition about him, cannot be regarded as therefore established.' x He does not think it probable that the Apostle, coming to Asia in mature life, could have undergone the intellectual development which must be presupposed in the evan gelist, who may be assumed to have gone to Asia ' at an age when his mind was more supple ' 2 than the Apostles can have been. The assumption that the evangelist had also seen and heard Jesus he regards as necessary because of the claim in i. 14 of eye-witness, also 1 John i. ' These expressions cannot be interpreted of spiritual sight and touch and hearing because these would not have been referred to merely as experiences in the past ; this meaning is also inconsistent with the general tenor of the contexts. One can, however, understand that the claim in question might be made by a youth or boy, younger by some years than the Apostle John even if the latter was the youngest of the Twelve, but who could remember having sometimes himself seen and heard Jesus, and who had derived a sense of knowledge which was at least almost immediate of the Divine revelation made in the Lord, by intimate association with His personal disciples very soon after His departure.' 3 The writer does not accept either of these arguments as conclusive, but the question of authorship will be later discussed. What has here to be noted is that, although Dr. Stanton makes no 1 The Gospels as Historical Documents, part iii., The Fourth Gospel, pp. 279-80. 2 Op. cit. p. 281. » Op. cit. p. 281. INTRODUCTION xxi attempt at an analysis, he recognizes in the Gospel the contributions of the witness and the evangelist. The only encouragement he gives to ' partition ' is the acknowledgment thatljthej 'Appendix is by a differ ent hand from the rest of the Gospel, ' although there appears to be no ground for interposing a long interval between the composition of the one and the other.' 1 (3) Only an indication can now be given of the hypotheses of the composition of the Gospel which will be presented in this volume. The Appendix on the one hand and the Prologue on the other afford us justi fication for distinguishing the contribution of a later editor, whom we may call the Redactor (R), and of the Evangelist (E) from the matter provided by the Witness (W) although his matter has passed through the hands of the Evangelist. The Appendix shows an ecclesiastical interest in the Synoptic tradition, which affords us a clue to other portions of the Gospel which we may ascribe to R. In this analysis the writer finds himself in very close agreement with Dr. Bacon, although he retains for the witness some passages which Dr. Bacon assigns to the redactor. The Prologue proves a theological interest of the evangel ist's which we can also trace elsewhere in the Gospel. Even in the contribution of the witness we can dis tinguish, if we cannot always separate, two strands. (Here John iii. is of special value.) The reminis cences of the witness, which include words and deeds of Jesus as well as his comments which cannot always be detected, very often pass over into reflexions, in which the results of his religious experience and the effects of his intellectual environment are blended together in one stream. These reminiscences and reflexions are reproduced by the evangelist, himself 1 Op. cit. p. 27. 62 xxii THE BELOVED DISCIPLE a disciple of the witness, to whose affection possibly is due the description of the witness as ' the disciple whom Jesus loved,' if it was not already current in a circle of disciples in Ephesus. It is not often possible to separate the reflexions from the reminiscences, nor even to distinguish the report of the evangelist apart from his own comments from the teaching as it was given by the witness. Even as regards the utterances of Jesus we cannot be always sure that we have the ipsissima verba, and not a paraphrase from the evan gelist's standpoint. While this solution of the problem may at first sight appear too complicated, yet with the data in our hands can any simple solution be expected ? To treat the Gospel as a unity on the one hand, or to resolve it verse by verse into its different elements, is a solution that the character of its composition forbids. What is here suggested is not a mechanical invention but a vital development, which has greater probability of truth. The Gospel grew rather than was made. The view here offered involves also a conclusion regarding authorship ; but that conclusion can be reserved until the analysis of the Gospel has been completed, as that analysis will itself offer the data, on which the conclusion rests. BIBLIOGRAPHY A. BOOKS REFERRED TO IN THIS VOLUME (I) THE FOURTH GOSPEL 1. The Gospel according to St. John, with Introduction and Notes, by B. F. Westcott. John Murray, 1890. 2. The Gospel of St. John, by Marcus Dods. The Expositor's Greek Testament, i. Hodder and Stoughton, 1897. 3. The Gospel according to St. John : an Inquiry into its Genesis and Historical Value, by H. H. Wendt. Eng. tr. T. and T. Clark, 1902. 4. The Character and Authorship of the Fourth Gospel, by Jas. Drummond. Williams and Norgate, 1903. 5. The Criticism of the Fourth Gospel, by Wm. Sanday. Claren don Press, 1905. 6. The Fourth Gospel : its Purpose and Theology, by E. F. Scott. T. and T. Clark, 1906. 7. The Ephesian Gospel, by Percy Gardner. Williams and Nor gate, 1915. 8. The Origin of the Prologue to St. John's Gospel, by Rendel Harris. Cambridge, 1917. 9. The Fourth Gospel : its Significance and Environment, by Robert Harvey Strachan. Student Christian Movement, 1917. 10. The Fourth Gospel in Research and Debate, by B. W. Bacon. Yale, 1918. 11. The Gospels as Historical Documents. Part, iii., The Fourth Gospel, by V. N. Stanton. Cambridge, 1920. 12. The Aramaic Origin of the Fourth Gospel, by C. F. Burney. The Clarendon Press, 1922. xxiv THE BELOVED DISCIPLE (II) NEW TESTAMENT 1. The Miraculous Element in the Gospels, by A. B. Bruce. Hodder and Stoughton, 1890. 2. The Theology of the New Testament, by G. B. Stevens. T. and T. Clark, 1899. 3. The Gospel History and its Transmission, by F. C. Burkitt. T. and T. Clark, 1906. 4. A Critical Introduction to the New Testament, by A. S. Peake. Duckworth, 1909. 5. An Introduction to the Literature of the New Testament, by James Moffatt. T. and T. Clark, 1911. 6. The New Testament: a New Translation, by Jas. Moffatt. Hodder and Stoughton, 1913. 7. Gospel Origins, by W. W. Holdsworth. Duckworth, 1913. (Ill) CHURCH HISTORY 1. Ante-Nicene Library. The Writings of Irenaeus. 2 vols. T. and T. Clark, 1884. 2. Niceneand Post-Nicene Fathers : The Church History of Emebius. Parker and Co., 1890. 3. The History of Dogma, by Harnack. Eng. tr., vol. i. Williams and Norgate, 1894. (IV) THEOLOGY 1. Eschatology, Hebrew, Jewish and Christian, by R. H. Charles. Black, 1899. 2. The Other Side of Death, by R. G. Macintyre. Macmillan and Co., 1920. B. ARTICLES REFERRED TO IN THIS VOLUME 1. The Appendix to the Fourth Gospel, by R. H. Steachan. The Expositor, 8th series, vol. vii. pp. 255 ff. 2. Is the Fourth Gospel a Literary Unity 1 by R. H. Straohan. The Expository Times, vol. xxvii. pp. 22 fi., 232 ff., 280 ff., 330 ff. BIBLIOGRAPHY xxv 3. Accidental Disarrangements in the Fourth Gospel, by J. M. Thompson. The Expositor, 8th series, vol. ix. pp. 421 ff. 4. Is John xxi. an Appendix ? by J. M. Thompson. The Expositor, 8th series, vol. x. pp. 139 ff. 5. The Structure of the Fourth Gospel, by J. M. Thompson. The Expositor, 8th series, vol. x. pp. 512 ff. 6. The Composition of the Fourth Gospel, by J. M. Thompson. The Expositor, 8th series, vol. xi. pp. 34 ff. 7. The Interpretation of John vi., by J. M. Thompson. The Expositor, 8th series, vol. xi. pp. 337 ff. 8. Some Editorial Elements in the Fourth Gospel, by J. M. Thomp son. The Expositor, 8th series, vol. xiv. pp. 214 ff. 9. The Beloved Disciple, by Swete. Journal of Theological Studies, July 1916, mentioned in The Expository Times, vol. xxviii. p. 97. 10. The Festival of Lives given for the Nation in Jewish and Chris tian Faith, by B. W. Bacon. The Hibbert Journal, vol. xv. pp. 256 ff. 11. The Fourth Gospel in the Light of Modern Scholarship, by A. T. Robertson. The Constructive Quarterly, vol. v. pp. 671 ff. 12. Irenaeus and the Fourth Gospel, by H. A. A. Kennedy. The Expository Times, vol. xxix. pp. 103 ff., 168 ff., 235 ff., 312 ff. 13. Jesus' ' Native Place ' in John, by B. W. Bacon. The Expositor, 8th series, vol. xxiii. pp. 41 ff. 14. The Fourth Gtospel and the Sacraments, by J. P. Naish. The Expositor, 8th series, vol. xxiii. pp. 53 ff. 15. The Disciple whom Jesus loved, by B. Grey Griffith. Exposi tory Times, vol. xxxii. pp. 379 ff. 16. The Disciple whom Jesus loved, by F. Warburton Lewis. Expository Times, vol. xxxiii. p. 42. 17. Was Lazarus ' the beloved Disciple ' ? by H. Rigg. Expository Times, vol. xxxiii. pp. 232 ff. 18. The Rearrangement of John vii. and viii., by G. H. C. Mac- gregor. Expository Times, vol. xxxiii. pp. 74 ff. xxvi THE BELOVED DISCIPLE 19. The Raising of Lazarus, by Edward Grubb. Expository Times, vol. xxxiii. pp. 404 ff. 20. A Sometimes Neglected Factor Illustrated, by Innes Logan. The Expositor, 8th series, vol. xxiv. pp. 75 ff. 21. Our Lord's Discourses with His Apostles after His Resurrec tion, by Rev. G. Henslow (pamphlet reprinted from The Interpreter). As the titles of books and articles have been so fully given, they will not be always repeated in the footnotes. ANALYSIS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL 1. The Evangelist. i. 1-18, 48 ; ii. 17, 21-22, 24-25 ; iii. 31-36 ; iv. 18, 44 ; v. 18 (?), 19-29 ; vii. 39 ; viii. 27 ; xi. 42, 51-52 ; xii. 33, 38-41 ; xiii. 1-3, 18-19 ; xiv. 29 ; xv. 25 ; xvii. 3, 12 ; xviii. 4, 9, 32 ; xix. 24, 28, 36, 37 ; xx. 30, 31. Some of the comments of the Evangelist may come from the Witness. 2. The Redactor. iv. 43-54(7); vi.; xii. 20-36; xiii. 36-38; xviii. 17-18, 25-27; xix. 35 ; xxi. . Some of the matter in vi. and xii. 20-36 is probably reminiscence of the Witness. 3. The Witness. (a) Reminiscences probably out of their proper context : iii. 14-15 ; vi. 62 ; iii. 13, 11, 12 ; vi. 51c-57 ; xiv. 16-20, 26 ; xv. 26-27 ; xvi. 7-15. (6) Reminiscences in proper context: i. 19-34 (except 30 =i. 15), 35-51 (vv. 41, 42, 45, 48, 49 contain doubtful elements) ; ii. 1-12; iii. 22-30; ii. 13-25 (except 17, 21-22, 24-25); iii. 1-10, 16-21 (reflexions on reminiscences) ; iv. 1-42 (except 18 doubtful and 24 a reflexion), 43-45 (except 44), 46-54 (doubtful) ; v. 1-18 (18c doubtful), 24, 30-47 ; vii. 15-24 ; vii. 1-14, 25-36 (possibly viii. 12-20 may follow here), 37-44, 45-52 (possibly 37-44 should follow 45-52) ; viii. 12-20 (if not after vii. 36), 21-59 (except 27) ; ix. 1-41 ; x. 19-29, 1-18, 30-39, 40-42 ; xi. 1-16 (doubtful), 17-46 (except 39 and 42), 47-53 (except 51 and 52), 54-57 ; xii. 1-11, 12-19, 44-50, 37-43 (except 38-40) ; xiii. 1-17 (except 1-3), 18-31a (except 186, 19, 20), possibly 34-35 ; xv. 1-25 (except 25) ; xvi. 1-6, xxviii THE BELOVED DISCIPLE 16-24 (possibly followed by x. 1-10), 25-33 ; xiii. 316-33 xiv. 1-25, 28-31 (except 29) ; xvii. 1-26 (except 3 and 12c) xviii. 1-14 or 16 (except 4 and 9), 24, 19-23, 28-40 xix. 1-34 (except parts of 24, 28) ; xix. 38-42 ; xx. 1-29. The displacements, for which reason is given in the discussion, have been assumed in the order given above ; where possible com ments, whether of evangelist or witness, have also been indicated as exceptions to the reminiscences. Any such analysis must be tentative. THE PROLOGUE (1) The Prologue has a twofold interest, (a) to assert the identity of the Word with Jesus, and (b) to deny the superiority of John the Baptist to Jesus. With reference to the second and subordinate interest a note from Dr. Peake's A Critical Introduction to the New Testament may be quoted, as although the writer read the work referred to on its appearance, he has not now access to it for the verification of his remembrance of it. ' This has been argued with great originality and acuteness, but also with much violent exegesis by Baldensperger in his Der Prolog des vierten Evan- geliums, 1898. His views have met with little ac ceptance, though the brilliance and suggestiveness of his discussions have been amply recognized. Pfleiderer and E. E. Scott think that he has made out his point for the first three chapters of the Gospel. On the other hand see Jiilicher and Loisy, also an article in the Journal of Biblical Literature, vol. xx., 1901, Part i., by Prof. C. W. Rishell.' 1 Without discussing Baldensperger's view, as it is not relevant to the main purpose of this volume we may ask, assuming for the moment the present order of verses as correct, why should the Gospel throw into the very forefront and interrupt the presentation of the primary and dominant purpose by the denial that John is »e* to be identified with the Logos as Jesus is, if there was no party or school which exalted John 1 P. 224. 2 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE above Jesus ? The report of John's witness to Jesus, and of the abandonment of John for Jesus by the first disciples gains greater significance, if such a conten tion had to be met. (2) The possibility must, however, be admitted that there are displacements in the Prologue, i.e. that the passages dealing with the Baptist, vv. 6-8 and v. 15 are insertions. Certainly vv. 1-5 and 9-14 would form a compact and continuous exposition of the doctrine of the Logos. On v. 14, vv. 16-18 would form an appropriate commentary. Verses 6-8 and 15 (of which v. 30 is a repetition which interrupts the sequence of vv. 29 and 31) would seem also to belong to the Prologue as v. 7 refers to v. 5, and v. 15 if it teaches as Westcott argues it does, that it is Christ's eternal nature that gave Him necessarily (historical) priority to John,1 puts on John's lips the metaphysical doctrine of the Prologue.2 Only if these verses about John do not belong to the Prologue does the above statement need modification. We may assume that these verses do belong to the Prologue, that they followed v. 18, and formed a suitable transition to the record of John in v. 19. (3) Was this twofold interest characteristic of the teacher (the witness) or the scholar (the evangelist) ? If the witness was, as is probable, one of the earliest disciples {v. 37) he would have a personal interest in justifying his preference for Jesus. But if he was an early disciple, is it likely that he would himself have so identified John with the Logos, as to be expressing a personal interest, a result of personal 1 ' The argument . . . points to a present consequence of an eternal truth.' (The Gospel according to St. John, p. 13.) 8 It is not likely that the Baptist was led by the Apocalyptic books as Dods suggests (Expositor's Greek Testament, i. 696) to affirm the Messiah's pre-existenee. THE PROLOGUE 3 experience, in a denial of the identity ? Does not the Prologue gain a living power if it is the confession of the experience of the evangelist ? He had been influenced by Philo's teaching ; he had for a time sought in what he had learned about the Baptist the realization of the ideal. What the witness had done for him was by the presentation of the life and teaching of Jesus to convince him that the Word had become flesh not in the Baptist but in the Christ. As doubtless in his former view he had not stood alone, so in report ing the witness's teaching, which had so changed all things for him, he was not merely confessing his own personal experience, but was making his personal appeal to his former associates to follow in the path into which he had been led. Apollos, who knew only the baptism of John, came from Alexandria (Acts xviii. 24-25) ; and Alexandria was Philo's home. The disciples who had been baptized only ' into John's baptism ' (xix. 1-3) were met with in Ephesus. Do not these two facts suggest a possible connexion of the teaching of Philo and the baptism of John in a school or party, which was at a later date still repre sented in Ephesus ? If the evangelist was won by the teaching of the witness from this party the Prologue gains in personal interest. (4) It must be admitted, however, that this is conjecture ; and that against the conjecture that the evangelist came by the way of Philo as well as the Baptist to Christ is that the theology of the Gospel, as we shall soon see, is not dominated by the philo sophy of Philo, neither is the theology of the Johannine Epistles, of which the evangelist may still be regarded as the author, (a) As regards this last point — the identity of the authorship of the Gospel and the Epistle — the words of Dr. Stanton may be quoted as 4 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE the writer himself is in this volume concerned only with the identity of the witness, and not of the evan gelist — for his present purpose only a subordinate consideration : ' My conclusion is that the First Epistle of St. John is from the same hand as the Gospel, and that it was written earlier. Difficulties connected with the supposition that the author is the same appear only when the Gospel is held to be the earlier writing. And there is nothing to constrain us to assign this order to them. Indeed the differences between them in the main point to the opposite one.' 1 (b) As regards the theology of this First Epistle in relation to that of the Prologue especially Stanton says : ' The thought in the opening verses of the Epistle is logically prior to that in the Prologue to the Gospel.' 2 Had the evangelist been a disciple of Philo that difference would have been at least improbable. (c) Stanton thinks it unlikely that a man of fully matured mind, as we must assume the witness to have been, would have been so ready to assimilate the teaching of Philo even to the extent that the teach ing of the Gospel shows, as a younger man — the evangelist — might have been. ' Although the com position of the Fourth Gospel did not require the Alexandrian training on the part of its author which some have held that it did, and although there need not have been any fundamental difference between the conception of the Person and Work of Jesus in the mind of a primitive apostle, and that which we meet with in this Gospel, yet it would be strange that one who had come among the Greek or Hellenised population of western Asia Minor in the last two or three decades of a long life should have been able in 1 The Gospels as Historical Documents, part iii. pp. 102-103. 2 P. 97. THE PROLOGUE 5 his presentation of the truth to adapt himself to his hearers and readers, laying aside earlier habits of speech and points of view, and should show also that in his own thought he has undergone development to the extent that we find here.' 2 With this judgment the writer entirely agrees, and has only to add these modifications : (i) that, as he will try to show, the Christology of the evangelist is not identical with that of the witness, who stands even in his reflexions nearer the primitive tradition ; and (ii) that the Christology of the evangelist is not so entirely domin ated by the Logos philosophy as has been assumed. To this consideration we next pass. (5) Dr. Scott affirms while Harnack denies that the identification of Jesus with the Logos dominates the whole of the Fourth Gospel.2 The writer's own study has led him to agree entirely with Harnack. What impressed the witness in the early life of Jesus was ' the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth ' (v. 14). It is this glory which shines in every page of the record. The interest of the Gospel is not cosmic, but ethical and spiritual ; and so the Son expresses the meaning he finds in Jesus, and not the Word. Doubtless it was the testimony of the witness which persuaded the evangelist that Jesus was the Word ; but the interest in the Logos was, to begin with, the latter's and not the former's. This explanation removes the difficulty of the otiose introduction of the idea of the Logos which the current view involves. That the Christology of the evangelist himself was influenced by the Logos philosophy cannot be denied ; but no less was it influenced by the 1 Op. cit. pp. 280-281. 2 Compare Scott's The Fourth Gospel, pp. 163-175; and Harnack's The History of Dogma, vol. i. p. 329. 6 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE doctrine of the Son, which he had learned from the witness. (6) If the evangelist has contributed this conception we need not ask whether a Palestinian origin of it can be proved, as we might have some reason to do if the conception were characteristic of the witness. (a) Bishop Westcott's view that ' the sources of the Logos doctrine in the Gospel were Palestinian and Biblical ' Dr. Stanton sets aside on the ground that this derivation does not as adequately account for the teaching of the Prologue as does a Philonic source.1 Dr. Stanton also dissents from the view advanced by Dr. Rendel Harris in his book, The Origin of the Pro logue to St. John's Gospel : ' Our hypothesis that the Logos of the Fourth Gospel is a substitute for a previously existing Sophia involves (or almost involves) the consequence that the Prologue is a hymn in honour of Sophia, and that it need not be in vthat sense due to the same authorship as the Gospel itself.' 2 The writer has himself found Dr. Harris's argument more ingenious than convincing. But even were his hypo thesis proved, the argument here would be in no way affected — that the Prologue is due to the evangelist and not to the witness. (6) We may still maintain the assumption that the doctrine of the Prologue depends on Philo. The reasons for adhering to this position are well stated by Dr. Stanton. ' Since in the writings of Philo, composed sixty or more years before the Fourth Gospel, we find a doctrine of the Logos, which in certain of its broad features (to say at present no more) resembles that of the Prologue ; since in Philo the Logos appears under a twofold aspect, the one 1 Op. cit. p. 162, note pp. 185-186. 1 Op. cit. p. 6. Dr. Burney's view is discussed at the end of this volume. THE PROLOGUE 7 interior to the life of God, the other as conditioning God's relation to the universe ; since there too it is through the Logos that God created and that He sustains and guides all things, and even the title Son of God is there given Him ; since through the Logos He reveals Himself to man, and only in the Logos that He can be known, it is surely unreasonable to suppose that the thought of the Prologue is wholly independent of that of the Alexandrian school, of the doctrines of which the writings of Philo are the repre sentatives to us.' 1 As the case of Apollos shows, a teacher from Alexandria might carry the teaching of Philo to Ephesus. (c) We need not assume that the evangelist had a first-hand knowledge of Philo's teaching, nor that when he was led to identify the Logos with the man Jesus he transferred even the conception of the Logos unmodified by the new associations. The witness's presentation of Jesus was dominated by the conception Son of God, and this is the characteristic feature of the Gospel as a whole. Whether the evangelist had, before coming under the influence of the witness, adopted the idea of the Logos as the solution of his own intellectual problem, or after he had already been convinced by that teaching, had borrowed it for his apologetic purpose, it was the evangelist, and not the witness who identified Jesus with the Word. Just as the more cosmic side of the work of Christ expounded in the Epistle to the Colos- sians was not native to the mind of Paul, but was forced upon him by the incipient Gnosticism of the heresy he was combating, so this new cosmic idea of the Logos was not congenial to the witness ; but it found its way into the Fourth Gospel through the evangelist for the one or the other of the reasons above suggested. 1 Op. cit. p. 186. 8 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE (7) The Logos doctrine of the Prologue has been influenced by the Christology of the Gospel ; and in the Prologue we may already detect the contrast of the two doctrines — the Philonic and the Johannine. Even if Dr. Harris's conclusions were accepted, the compari son 1 with the fully developed Philonic doctrine of the Logos would retain its interest and value. (i) The contrast which has been most insisted on is this, that for Philo the Logos, while more than a personification, is not yet a person, while in the Fourth Gospel the Logos is personal : and this difference is regarded as a proof of the greater theological genius of the evangelist ; but this way of dealing with the matter seems to the writer quite erroneous, and to ignore two very important considerations, (a) It is not by any greater speculative insight that the evan gelist advances beyond Philo. It would have been no merit in Philo, had he conceived the Logos as a person distinct from God, but a defect, as he would have thereby abandoned his monotheism, and have moved towards polytheism. There was nothing in the revelation of God, so far as he as a pious Jew had received it, to warrant any such step. Until the Incarnation there was no necessity for thought to raise the problem of the personality of the Logos. What led the evangelist to go beyond Philo was ' the fact of Christ.' How could the historical personality find a place within the Godhead ? The doctrine of the Logos seemed to offer a bridge for thought from history to theology. We must try to reproduce the mental process as accurately as we can. It was not any speculative genius which led to the discovery of 1 The Origin of the Prologue to St. John's Gospel. He finds in the Prologue ' a hymn in honour of Sophia ' (p. 6) and derives it from the Jewish Wisdom literature (p. 43). THE PROLOGUE 9 the necessity of personal distinctions within the God head ; Christian faith has not usually felt itself much at home in these speculative constructions. What was present to the evangelist's mind through the teaching of the witness was the concrete individuality of Jesus ; this he identifies with the Logos, without considering the metaphysical difficulties which such an identification involved, difficulties from which Christology in its subsequent developments made ineffectual attempts to escape. Paul's procedure in Phil. ii. 1-11 is similar.1 The historical personality is transferred to the eternal reality ; the Logos is conceived as personal because identified with the person of Jesus. That Christian faith saw God in Christ is assuredly an immeasurably great advance for the religious thought and life of mankind ; but that is not the same as regarding the doctrine of the Prologue as speculatively an advance on Philo's idea. (b) We must not conceal from ourselves the fact that the identification of Jesus with the Logos was rather a problem than a solution for speculative theological thought. If we invest the Son or the Logos in the Godhead with the concrete individuality of Jesus, regard Him not only as personal, but as a person in the modern sense of the word, we make the Godhead incomprehensible or sacrifice the divine unity to tritheism. Subsequently Christological thought showed that where the equality of Father and Son and the unity of the Godhead were emphasized, the doctrines of a distinct personal Logos fell into the background ; wherever, on the contrary, the Logos doctrine pre vailed, and the difference from God was asserted, the divine monarchy was safeguarded by an insistence on the subordination of the Logos. We must regard 1 See Studies of Paul and his Gospel, by the writer, pp. 117-118. 10 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE the Logos doctrine as an ally of very doubtful value to Christian theology ; and the greater emphasis on the distinct personality of the Logos only increases the difficulties for thought. (ii) The problem which Philo sought to solve by his Logos doctrine was primarily a cosmic one, the relation of the finite world to an Infinite God. The Prologue to the Fourth Gospel does (v. 3) refer to the making of the world by the Word ; but immediately passes from the cosmic to the moral and religious interest. That the physical images of light and dark ness are used does not involve a physical dualism as the basis of the moral and religious contrast in human history on which such stress is laid. It is with un belief and unrighteousness and faith and goodness that the Gospel and the Prologue are alone concerned. The writer cannot see any warrant for the assertion that the Logos doctrine has influenced the Fourth Gospel as regards the choice of the miracles recorded. The feeding of the five thousand and the walking on the water (vi. 1-21) are derived from the Synoptic tradition. The miraculous draught of fishes (xxi. 6) has a parallel in Luke's Gospel (v. 4-7). If the writer is correct in his theory regarding the additions by the redactor, neither of these narratives belongs to the Gospel in its earliest form. The relation of the witness (the beloved disciple) to Mary the mother of Jesus and his own presence adequately account for the report of the turning of the water into wine at Cana (ii. 1-11). The record shows no trace of the evangelist's interest in the cosmic functions of the Logos. Here there is a marked contrast between the Fourth Gospel and Philo's teaching. (iii) In Philo the Logos is a necessity for thought as mediating between the transcendent, incomprehensible, THE PROLOGUE 11 and indefinable deity and the world. The divine transcendence is the dominating consideration ; but even in the Prologue God is brought very near to man. It is the glory of the only begotten from the Father which men behold. The invisible God has been de clared by the Son in the bosom of the Father. Men through Him may gain the right to become the children of God (vv. 12-14, 18). Throughout the Gospel im manence is the key-word. The Father dwells in the Son, and the Son in the Father : the believer dwells in Christ, and Christ in him ; and the Father in the Son dwells in men, and men in Him.1 The dualism of which the Philonic doctrine of the Logos is a result, is foreign to the Gospel. In this, as in other respects, the Logos doctrine is no clue to the interpretation of the Gospel. (8) The teaching about pre-existence peculiar to the Gospel is not necessarily only a deduction from the Logos-idea, but may be brought into relation with Jesus' religious consciousness. It may be convenient to deal with the passages presenting this conception at this stage. In i. 30, John the Baptist is represented as already testifying to the pre-existence of the man who was to come after him, on irpa>To<; /mov rjv, the personal superiority is based on temporal priority. Was John the Baptist likely to know of the pre-exist ence of Christ ; and was he the man to express himself in such subtle language ? As this verse almost verbatim reproduces the statement in v. 15, it is prob ably a later gloss, for which neither the witness nor the evangelist is responsible. When in iii. 13 it is stated that ' no man hath ascended into heaven, but He that descended out of heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven,' it is more probable that we have before us a comment of the evangelist to explain 1 Chaps, xiv. -xv. 12 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE the phrase ' heavenly things ' than a saying of Jesus. If it fell from the lips of Jesus it was certainly not in the interview with Nicodemus that it was spoken, but at a later date in the ministry. ' Many ancient authorities omit which is in heaven ' (R.V. marg.). The allusions to descent from heaven in the discourse in Capernaum (vi. 33, 38, 50, 58, 62) are entirely im probable in the historical conditions, and in this dis course we must recognize the development in the mind of the witness of pregnant sayings of Jesus (even if they are not comments of the evangelist). The challenge to opponents in viii. 14, ' I know whence I am, and whither I go,' does not explicitly assert pre- existence. But the words in viii. 58 do, ' Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am.' Westcott's comment on the last words is : ' The phrase marks a timeless existence. In this connexion " I was " would have expressed simple priority.' x As Jesus' claim was challenged, His certainty of His relation as Son to God as Father grew ; and this certainty might include a distinct intuition that this relation was not, and could not be temporal, but must be eternal as God Himself. While for reasons to be afterwards shown, we cannot accept the seven teenth chapter of the Gospel as the ipsissima verba of Jesus, yet the dominant conception of His death as a return to the glory that He had before the world was (v. 5) is not improbably a reminiscence of what Jesus did say to a disciple who could understand His deeper thoughts as the Twelve, according to the Synoptic testimony itself, could not.2 This inward certainty 1 Westcott's St. John, p. 140. * ' The confidence with which John lets him speak to the Father, " Thou lovedst me before the foundation of the world," is surely overheard from Jesus' own certainty.' (Harnack, Das Wesen des Christentums, p. 81.) THE PROLOGUE 13 need not and cannot be represented, as by Tholuck, in an extreme metaphysical form as ' a continuity of the consciousness of the historical Christ with the Logos.' x A developing human consciousness that carried the remembrance of the previous state of existence is unintelligible and incredible. The word pre-existence is itself a contradiction in terms, for it describes the eternal reality of the relation of Father and Son in the Godhead in temporal terms. The explanation given above of a certain intuition of eternal relation to God, which may have emerged in Jesus' consciousness only when to meet the challenge of men He needed and gained such assurance from God, is both credible and intelligible. Such an intuition can also be harmonized with the Christology which is based on history, and not on speculation, and recog nizes a progressive Incarnation under the conditions of human development. 1 Quoted by Dods in loco, The Expositor's Greek Testament, i. p. 841. II COMMENTS BY THE EVANGELIST While it is the evangelist who has reproduced the teaching of the witness in the Gospel ; while it is in his language that the report is given, except where there may be the ipsissima verba of the reminiscences and reflexions of the witness, and while we cannot now with certainty separate what is due to the one or to the other throughout the Gospel ; yet there are comments which we may ascribe to him rather than to his teacher. His adoption of the Logos doctrine in the Prologue on the one hand, and the indications given in the First Epistle of his own theology on the other, may serve as a clue. It is true that that theology had been formed under the influence of the teaching of the witness, but that does not involve that the scholar cannot have developed the teaching he had received : and evidence can now be offered that his tendency was to emphasize the supernaturalness of the person of Jesus in putting on His words and works a construction which the report which he himself gives does not itself demand. We can get nearer to the historical reality as presented by the witness when we have set aside the comments of the evangelist. It is possible that some of the comments may go back to the witness himself, if we assume that he too had undergone a theological development similar to the evangelist's ; but to distinguish the one from the other u COMMENTS BY THE EVANGELIST 15 possible source is an impossible task, and our purpose does not require it. (1) The first kind of comment places the Fourth Gospel alongside of the Synoptic Gospels. The interest in the fulfilment of prophecy was common to all the writers of the New Testament. In Jesus' zeal in cleansing the Temple the disciples are represented as recognizing the fulfilment of the words, ' The zeal of thine house shall eat me up ' (ii. 17, Ps. lxix. 9). In Jesus' riding into Jerusalem on an ass (xii. 14, 15) is found a fulfilment of the prophecy of Zechariah regarding the peaceableness of the Messiah (ix. 9). In the unbelief of the people the statement of the prophet regarding the servant of Yahveh, and Isaiah's own experience are seen to have a counterpart (xii. 37- 41, Is. liii. 1, vi. 10). The Psalmist's complaint anti cipates the causeless hate directed against Jesus according to His own utterance (xv. 25, Ps. xxxv. 19) as also the betrayal by Judas (xiii. 18, Ps. xii. 9). The fulfilment of prophecy is found also in the three details of the Crucifixion — the dividing of the Garments, the leaving of the Body unbroken, and the piercing of the side (xix. 24, Ps. xxii. 18, v. 36, Ps. xxxiv. 20, v. 37, Zech. xii. 10). Jesus Himself is represented as assigning the fulfilment of scripture as the reason why only the son of perdition has perished (xvii. 12, Ps. cix. 8). It is possible that in xix. 28, the evangelist gives as the motive of Jesus' cry, ' I thirst,' the desire to accomplish the scriptures as he elsewhere ventures to interpret the inner life of Jesus, but it is more probable that he himself sees in the word the fulfilment of prophecy. ' Jesus did not feel thirsty and proclaim it with the intention of fulfilling scripture — which would be a spurious fulfilment — but in His com plaint and the response to it, John sees a fulfilment of 16 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE Ps. lxix. 22.' x This kind of comment, however, throws no special light on the theology either of evangelist or witness. (2) The second kind of comment seeks to show the meaning that was, not at the time, but only afterwards seen in utterances of Jesus. In Jesus' challenge, ' Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up ' (ii. 19), a reference is found to the temple of the body, but it is admitted that the saying was remem bered, and so understood only after the Resurrection (vv. 21-22). An explicit reference to the Resurrec tion we may be sure was not intended by Jesus at the time, although it is just possible that He did in His own mind connect the spiritual restoration that He anticipated with His own experience. Jesus' reference to the streams of living water that should flow from believers (vii. 38) probably indicates abundance of spiritual life, and is not intended as an express promise of the Spirit, as it is taken to be (v. 39). The teaching of Jesus regarding Him that sent Him, misunderstood by the people, is quite properly referred to the Father (viii. 27). These two kinds of comments may be just as fitly referred to the witness as to the evangelist. (3) It is in the third kind of comment that the evangelist in offering reasons for the words or the works of Jesus betrays his own conception of the person of the Incarnate Word. These comments are not to be regarded as merely applications of the Logos doctrine to the person of Christ, as on the one hand we have already indicated that the Logos doctrine does not dominate the Gospel, and on the other the comments can be regarded as hyperbolic statements of supernatural features which we must recognize as 1 Marcus Dods in Expositor's Greek Testament, i. p. 858. COMMENTS BY THE EVANGELIST 17 belonging to the person of Christ according to His own self-witness, although, as exaggerations, out of harmony with the conception of the jjerson which we may derive from that witness. (i) It is doubtful whether in the words in v. 18c, ' making himself equal with God,' the evangelist is simply repeating the inference of the Jewish opponents from the words of Jesus : ' My Father worketh even until now, and I work ' (v. 17), or is himself presenting that view. If he does, then he contradicts the assertion of the entire dependence of the Son on God as Father (v. 19) and the argument (x. 34-36) from the use of the word gods in the Psalms (lxxxii. 6), as well as the express declaration that the Father is greater (xiv. 28). (ii) The general statement regarding the knowledge of men by Jesus (ii. 24, 25) gives the impression that the evangelist desires to ascribe omniscience to Jesus ; and yet the verbs yivmo-tcew and eyivcoaicev, if the dis tinction usually made is to hold good, point to an acquired knowledge, and not an innate. We may affirm a tendency to lay emphasis on the supernatural- ness of Jesus' knowledge. In Jesus' answer to Nathanael (i. 48) and the surprise it evokes he intends to represent the knowledge of Jesus as more than the moral and spiritual insight into the inner life of others which the Synoptists also assign to Him (Mark ii. 8). The mention to the woman of Samaria of the number of her husbands (iv. 18) may be explained as a mistake on her part in reporting the conversation, as it was easy for her in her excited condition to transfer the contents of her own guilty conscience to the speech of Jesus (a conjecture which the hyperbole of v. 29 confirms) ; but the evangelist's intention in his record is clearly to emphasise this supernatural knowledge. A supernatural insight, moral and religious, into the 18 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE inner life of others with a view to His ' cure of souls ' we may ascribe to Jesus consistently with the necessary conditions of Incarnation, but the evangelist evidently thinks of something more. (iii) In one set of explanations the evangelist aims at exhibiting the accuracy of Jesus' fore-knowledge, and the infallibility of His judgment in regard to all His deeds. It is doubtful whether in the phrase ' his own country ' the reference is to Judaea or to Galilee (iv. 44).1 Whichever it may be, the evangelist desires to make clear that Jesus was guided, not by circum stances, but by His own convictions. His view of the intention of Jesus to retire from the excitement His ministry had caused in Judaea to quieter labours in Galilee, however, approves itself. For the simple act recorded in xviii. 4, there seems to be no necessity of seeking a motive as the evangelist does. It is uncertain whether the evangelist sees in Jesus' plea for the safety of His disciples a fulfilment of His own utterance (xviii. 8, 9), or would have us believe that the prediction was the reason why Jesus spoke as He did. If the latter be his intention, it introduces an element of unreality into the life of Jesus that we may be sure was always absent from it. Conscious of the humility of Jesus in washing the disciples' feet, the evangelist ' protests too much ' (xiii. 1-3) Jesus' sense of His own dignity, and so invests that act with an excess of condescension which would rob it of its grace. It is his own theology that he here transfers to Jesus' inner life. (4) In the fourth kind of comment the evangelist puts on the lips of Jesus Himself explanations of words and works, which show rather his own con ception than the consciousness of Jesus as revealed 1 Cf. Matt. xiii. 57. COMMENTS BY THE EVANGELIST 19 to us even in the evidence the Gospel itself offers of His ' inner life.' An impression of unreality, of some thing spectacular, in the ministry of Jesus is made by the explanation given of Jesus' ejaculation, ' Father, I thank thee that thou heardest me ' (xi. 41) which is itself quite credible. Would Jesus, addressing the Father in such an hour, be thinking of the impression to be made on the multitude (v. 42) ? One cannot avoid the suspicion that the apologetic use of His foresight in warning (xiii. 19, ' From henceforth I tell you before it come to pass, that, when it is come to pass, ye may believe that I am He ') or promise (xiv. 29, ' And now I have told you before it came to pass, that, when it is come to pass, ye may believe that I am He '), would be artificial and unnatural on the part of Jesus Himself. The difficulty of the assump tion that the evangelist put his own words on the lips of Jesus might be removed by the conjecture that it was a comment of the witness that was transformed in his memory into words of Jesus. (5) Several other comments there are which cannot be classified. Can we doubt that it is the witness's own confession of faith which has slipped into the prayer of Jesus (xvii. 3) ? Would Jesus Himself in prayer have defined eternal life, or described Himself as Jesus Christ ? It is his own view of the death of Christ that he imposes on the utterance of the High Priest (xi. 51, 52), for even had the High Priest pos sessed the prophetic endowment, its exercise would not have given him such insight into Christian doctrine. Again, the reason for the Jews' reply, ' It is not lawful for us to put any man to death,' is found in the necessity of the fulfilment of Jesus' own prediction regarding the manner of His death (xviii. 31-33). The dis cussion of these comments is not only relevant to the 20 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE literary and historical criticism of the Gospel, but necessary also for our understanding of the theology. They modify, and not advantageously, the doctrine of the Person of Christ which the Gospel as historical testimony offers for our consideration. (6) There are some longer passages which are more probably comments of the evangelist than reflexions on his reminiscences of the witness, (i) The first of these passages is iii. 31-36. If, as is not improbable, the preceding passage, vv. 22-30, only is displaced and should follow ii. 12, then this passage is a comment on the witness's reflexions in vv. 16-21. If, however, vv. 31-36 have also been displaced with vv. 22-30, then the passage is the evangelist's explanation of the superiority of Jesus as Bridegroom Himself to the friend of the bridegroom (v. 29). Even the Baptist, great as he is as sent before the Christ, is still of the earth, and can speak only of the earth, whereas the Christ as from heaven can bear direct personal testi mony to the heavenly reality. While his testimony is generally disbelieved, the believer can confirm that testimony as the very truth of God. The thought here offers several points of resemblance to that of the Prologue. The reason for the trustworthiness of the heavenly witness is further developed. He who has come from heaven is the Son of God, loved, sent endued with the Spirit without measure either as His own possession or as the channel of its communica tion, and given all things of God. If in the clause in V. 34, ov yap Ik fierpov SlBcoo-iv to irvev/j,a, the subject is Jesus as in the preceding clause, and the recipients are believers, then the fulness of the Spirit in the Christian Church is offered as confirmation of the truth of the message from God received through Him. If God is the subject (as in A.V.) and Christ the COMMENTS BY THE EVANGELIST 21 recipient, then the clause offers an interesting contri bution to the Christology of the Gospel, which shows a point of contact with the Synoptic account of the Baptism. Christ Himself receives the Spirit which He afterwards imparts. But the interpretations are not mutually exclusive : for communication implies possession. The explicit statement of the truth would have an added interest ; as it would show that the evangelist did expressly conceive the relation of the Father to the Son as mediated by the Spirit. This is not a valueless theological subtlety ; but thereby the inner life of Jesus is brought into closer likeness to that of His disciples. The Reformed Christology afterwards made fuller use of the idea of the mediation of the Spirit than did the Lutheran. Verses 35-36 draw the practical conclusion from the doctrinal statement. Since testimony of such authority demands acceptance, belief results in eternal life, and disobedi ence in the divine displeasure. (ii) As has already been indicated, the evangelist appears to regard the saying of v. 17 as a claim by Jesus of an equality with God. This equality he then expounds in the passage vv. 19-29, which cannot be regarded as belonging to the witness's reminiscences or even reflexions, (a) What at once strikes us in reading the passage is the twofold mode of Jesus' reference to Himself. In vv. 30-47 and in vii. 15-24 (which we shall afterwards see is to be treated as the continuation of the discourse) He speaks of Himself in the first person, and there is nothing in these passages altogether incongruous with the occasion. But in v. 19-29, apart from the introductory formula, ' Verily, verily, I say unto you ' (vv. 19, 24, 25) He refers to Himself in the third person, except in v. 24, which, as faith is set forth as the condition of eternal life, presents 22 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE no difficulty, and may be at once accepted as a saying suitable to the occasion. But its proper place would seem to be after v. 38. But is the exposition in those other verses of the intimate and absolute relation of the Father and the Son, with its reference to the future judgment and the future resurrection, at all likely to have been given by Jesus to His opponents ? Even if less reserved in Jerusalem than in Galilee, is it credible that at this stage He so entirely cast off reserve, especially when such language would provoke only deeper misunderstanding and keener hostility ? So apposite is Jesus' speech in the Synoptics, that we must suspect in the Fourth Gospel utterances which do not seem necessary or relevant to the occasion. Does not the use of the third person throughout in the balancing of Father and Son in their mutual relations appear much more credible as a later doc trinal development ? The eschatology of this passage is also in contrast to the teaching of Jesus, as reported in the Gospel, of a present judgment, a spiritual re surrection, and an eternal life here and now. Verse 24 affirms all these modifications of the current eschatology as stated in vv. 25-29. Regarding this passage Dr. Strachan's statement may be heartily accepted : ' After his fashion the evangelist suddenly moves from the actual historical situation to the contemporary situation. They are no longer the Jews of Jerusalem who are disputing about the Divinity of Jesus, but the Jews of Asia Minor, disputing with the Christian Church of the day.' x (b) The develop ment of the thought is as follows. The absolute dependence of the Son on the Father is shown in the entire resemblance of the Son's work to the Father's. As the dependence is one of love, it involves a complete 1 The Fourth Gospel, p. 116. COMMENTS BY THE EVANGELIST 23 knowledge by the Son of the Father's purpose, and a fulfilment of that purpose through the Son in a still more wonderful way than that already witnessed in the healing miracles. The power to raise the dead, and the authority to judge, both divine prerogatives, are entrusted to the Son in order that He may receive equal honour with the Father. So far the argument is plain ; but two meanings can be assigned to the raising from the dead and the judgment. Is it a present inward experience or a future outward occur rence ? Verses 25, 28, 29, except the clause in v. 25, ' and now is,' which is not repeated in vv. 28 and 29, refer to the general physical resurrection and the final universal judgment. The evangelist believed as the whole Christian Church then believed ; and we can understand how he would regard these events as Christ's greater works. But Jesus would not have so referred to these in controversy with His opponents, and vv. 21-23 and the clause in v. 25 point to a present inward experience, as does v. 24, which, however, does not seem to belong to this context. For our thought there is some incongruity between the future event as it was anticipated in its outward form in the Apos tolic Age and the present experience, although the evangelist may have been able to combine the two, the future event being the necessary and appropriate completion of the present experience. We may share the latter, but the former has fallen into the back ground, if it has not vanished altogether from the range of our spiritual vision. The theological state ment here has an experimental value, and not merely a speculative, as it touches experience very closely. The Christian experience has an absolute validity, for, as Christ's work now or hereafter, it is God's own work, because of the relation of the Father to the Son 24 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE which is here set forth. The passage does go beyond what Jesus is likely HimseK to have said on this occasion ; it does not go beyond a reasonable inter pretation of Christian experience, even although while according equal honour to the Father and the Son in our worship, we may be constrained, as was Paul (1 Cor. viii. 6, Col. i. 19, Phil. ii. 9, 1 Cor. iii. 23, xv. 28) to recognize in our theology a necessary subordination of the Son to the Father, as the first two verses here do. (c) To vv. 28-29 exception can be taken on another ground. ' This is,' says Dr. R. G. Macintyre, * the only passage in any of the Gospels which speaks of a resur rection of others than the righteous, and therefore based on another principle than faith — union with Christ. . . . What are we to make of this passage which seems to be in direct contradiction to the whole trend of the Fourth Gospel ? . . . The only method of inter pretation which would permit us to retain verses 28- 29 as a genuine part of Johannine teaching would be to take them as an exceedingly bold piece of symbolism and interpret them spiritually in harmony with the preceding verses. This view has attractions for the present writer, but the language used and the way it comes in compels him, somewhat reluctantly, to put it aside.' 1 Canon Charles is quoted by this writer as remarking on the passage : ' The scene is depicted in a most materialistic form, in fact it would be hard to find a more unspiritual description of the resurrection in the whole literature of the first century a.d.' 2 ' Following Wendt,' says Macintyre, ' he would excise it from the Gospel as an intrusion by a less spiritual mind.' These opinions give confirmation to the conclusion here stated regarding the whole passage 1 The Other Side of Death, pp. 173-175. 2 Eschatology, p. 371. COMMENTS BY THE EVANGELIST 25 (vv. 19-29). It must be added that the evangelist has not inserted this addition at what would appear to us the most appropriate place, as it is incongruous with the context. A more suitable occasion would be, as Mr. Thompson suggests, after the raising of Lazarus in chapter xi. (7) The recognition of this distinct theological tendency first of all to exaggerate the supernaturalness of the person of Jesus, and then to represent Jesus as seeking to make an impression by His display of His supernatural powers, cannot be confined to the passages which bear so distinct evidence of being comments by the evangelist. It must affect, and does affect, his representation of the words and works of Jesus, even when we cannot separate comments from the report of the witness's teaching. While it is entirely probable that on the one hand Jesus revealed His inner life more freely to a disciple who could under stand Him so much better than the others could, and on the other that in controversy with the rulers and the teachers of the nation who challenged His claim, He asserted His dignity and authority more confidently and constantly than was necessary, or even desirable, with the multitude in Galilee ; yet one cannot suppress the conviction that the evangelist has not only at times transferred to the lips of Jesus his own inferences from the relation of the Father to the Son as he con ceived it, but has given to Jesus a certain artificial pose of the debater and controversialist, which places Him in a less attractive light than do the Synoptists. We cannot conjecture how far the witness in his teach ing had already given this colour to the teaching of Jesus, or how far it is entirely due to the evangelist. As the zeal of the one or the other to vindicate the claims of Jesus, it has a different moral value than 26 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE when it is presented under the guise of Jesus' anxiety to assert HimseK. (8) As in his Comments the evangelist most directly expresses his own theology, this seems the appropriate place at which to refer to the resemblance between the teaching of the Johannine Epistles and that of the Fourth Gospel. As his teaching was influenced by what he had heard from the witness, even if the Gospel be later than the Epistles, that resemblance is not confined to his comments, (a) The style of both has much in common with the parallelism of the Psalms and other poetical writings of the Old Testa ment. The truth is stated in co-ordinated sentences, complementary in thought. Common to both are such key- words as ic6o-fj,o<;, %p>t), 6dvaTo<>, akrjOeia, i/rewSos, (f>co<; o-KOTia, gtkotos, aXr^Qivoi, ajairav, aydnrrj, (pikelv, fitaeiv. In both the contrasts of life and death, truth and falsehood, light and darkness, love and hate, faith and unbelief, are vividly presented. There is very little use made of the Old Testament. Where the First Epistle uses terms unknown to the Gospel, the special circumstances and the polemical purpose afford an adequate explanation, (b) Some differences there are in the theology. The Epistle gives a prominence to Christ's atoning death and His forgiving and cleansing grace which is not found in the Gospel, although as will be shown in the discussion of vi. 51c and vv. 52-57, this theme is not altogether absent. Apart from certain clauses which may be regarded as editorial additions, the Gospel does not lay stress on the Second Coming (the apocalyptic teaching), but rather on the relation of Jesus to His disciples in His Spirit (the mystical teaching), whereas the Epistle has the common apostolic hope of a speedy outward appearance of the Lord. The Epistle, how- COMMENTS BY THE EVANGELIST 27 ever, departs from the common apocalyptic standpoint in identifying Antichrist with false teaching, and in insisting on Christ's spiritual presence with believers and eternal fife as a present possession. A striking difference, that this Gospel speaks of abiding in Christ, and the Epistle of abiding in God, is easily explained by the change of standpoint. ' The special theme,' says Dr. Ramsay,1 ' of the Gospel is the Word who imparts life ; the special theme of the Epistle is the life which the Word imparts. It is with the historic presentment that the one has to do ; the other is concerned with God as He is revealed in Christ.' It would be beyond the scope of the purpose of this volume to deal more fully with this subject, as there is no intention to deny the identity of the evangelist and the author of the Epistles. (9) While the writer believes that the Christian Church in forming its doctrine of the Person of Christ need not confine itseK to the Synoptics as the sole reliable historical testimony, but may use the Fourth Gospel in so far as Jesus' seK-witness renders explicit what is implicit in the Synoptics, yet it must not be forgotten that in the Fourth Gospel doctrine does blend with history, and even, as has just been shown, doctrine of a somewhat aggressive type. There is a Johannine interpretation of the person of Christ just as there is a Pauline ; only that as regards the one the doctrine is presented in the guise of history as it is not in the other, but criticism can separate the two blended elements, if not with certainty, yet with a 1 The Revelation and the Johannine Epistles, by Alex. Ramsay (Westminster New Testament, 1910), pp. 29-34. See also The Epistles of St. John, by B. F. Westcott (Macmillan & Co., 1886), pp. xliii- xlvi ; The Epistles of John, by David Smith (The Expositor's Greek Testament, v. 1890, pp. 152-154) ; The General Epistles, by W. H. Bennett (The Century Bible, 1901), pp. 71-73. 28 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE high degree of probability. When we have thus separated the doctrine from the history, we do not need to set it aside as valueless, just as we do not set aside the Pauline interpretation, and for the same reason. In the Johannine interpretation there is not only a historical basis, it rests, as does the Pauline, also on a personal experience (that of the witness transmitted to the evangelist) ; for we can detect in the Fourth Gospel not only the impressions which the historical reality of Jesus left on the receptive and responsive soul of the witness, but also the influence in his inner life of the spiritual presence of Christ, and some of his reflexions on his own reminiscences may be described as experimental rather than theological. (10) Regarding the presentation throughout the Fourth Gospel of the glory of the only-begotten of the Father, it may at this stage of the discussion be said that it is not so great a distortion of history by doctrine that we cannot go back from faith to fact. For (a) in the Synoptics Jesus is represented as the Son of God, and in one passage (Matt. xi. 25- 27— Luke x. 22) Jesus is reported as making a claim for HimseK beyond which the Fourth Gospel does not in the substance of its teaching go. (6) As subsequent discussion will show, the context of the passages in which a more supernatural endowment seems to be assigned to the person of Jesus than in the Synoptics allows us to correct the representation so as to get back to the facts, (c) While the Fourth Gospel does not expressly teach that the becoming flesh of the Word was a Kenosis or seK-emptying, yet the Sonship is presented as an ethical and spiritual relation, such a dependence on, and submission to, as well as knowledge of and fellowship with the Father COMMENTS BY THE EVANGELIST 29 as excludes the metaphysical attributes of absolute deity from the earthly life, (d) A historical exegesis yields a different impression of the teaching of the Gospel than a commentary such as Bishop Westcott's which reads into the Gospel the Christological dogma of a later age. Ill THE APPENDIX (JOHN XXI.) The writer finds it quite impossible to regard the Appendix as the work of the evangelist. It is true that there is no textual evidence as in regard to Mark xvi. 9-20 to show that it is a later addition. It is true also that the style closely resembles that of the rest of the Gospel. But the author of such an addition would make it his business to copy the style as nearly as possible, and we cannot affirm that before our present texts were produced, such an addition may not have been made. ' Even within the brief space of the Appendix, idiosyncrasies of language and style appear which are practically sufficient to indicate another hand.' 1 Neither of the considerations mentioned above bars the way to the conclusion that the contents of the chapter force upon us. The immediate purpose of this addition was both to prove Peter's restoration to apostolic authority (vv. 15-17), and to remove a current misconception of a traditional saying about the beloved disciple (v. 23), which his death or the death of the person identified with him in common opinion (probably recent) had made a stumbling-block to faith. The occasion is also used to add a joint attestation from the circle in which the writer of the Appendix moved, of the trustworthiness of the evan- 1 Moffatt's Introduction, p. 572, which may be consulted for further details. 30 THE APPENDIX 31 gelist, and so the worth of the Gospel (v. 24). It is hard to believe that the evangelist could have borne such seK-witness. If, as is maintained, in this volume the evangelist must be distinguished from the witness, then the identification in this attestation of the witness (6 fiaprvp&p) and the writer (6 ypd\fra<:) con tains an error. Further, the writer of the Appendix desires to convey the impression that the beloved disciple, the author of the Gospel, was John the son of Zebedee. (1) The first part of the Appendix (vv. 1-14) presents a parallel to the account given by Luke (v. 1-11) of the call given to Peter. While there are differences in details it is difficult to resist the conclusion that both passages contain variant traditions of the same incident. The writer has elsewhere expressed the opinion J that Peter's confession in Luke v. 8, ' Depart from me ; for I am a sinful man, 0 Lord,' found a more appropriate context in the record of restoration to discipleship after his denial, as given in the Fourth Gospel, than in the record of the first call as found in Luke. Further study has, however, modified this judg ment. As will afterwards be shown, the Galilaeans in the small company of disciples, whose attachment to Jesus is recorded in John i. 35-51, followed Him only for a time ; and had to be recalled when the Galilaean ministry began (Matt. iv. 18-22, Mark i. 16- 20). Had they wavered for a time in their allegiance and gone back to their old calling, and was what the Synoptics represent as a first call not only a recall but a restoration ? This would explain not only Luke v. 8, but also John xxi. 15-17, if this passage belongs to the same context, but for reasons given below this is not likely. We must consider other possibilities. 1 Studies in the Inner Life of Jesus, pp. 236, 443. 32 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE The story about the miracle may be due to a late tradition in which the figurative saying about the disciples becoming fishers of men was misunderstood, and was turned into an actual miracle of an abundant, unexpected draught. It is very difficult to under stand how, if this account relates to the beginning of the Galilaean ministry, Mark, dependent as he was on Peter for his knowledge, has no trace of it. We cannot even conjecture whether, if we had Mark's Gospel complete, this story would have been found in the same context as in the Fourth Gospel. What ever the original tradition may have been, it is clear that the writer of this Appendix has adapted it for his own purpose. This is obvious in regard to vv. 1 and 14. As regards the mention of the two sons of Zebedee (v. 2) it is to be observed that nowhere else in the Fourth Gospel is there any reference to them. The writer of the Appendix evidently intends to identify ' the disciple whom Jesus loved ' (vv. 7 and 20) with one of the brothers ; and yet there seems to be some doubt in his mind, and he leaves himseK a door of escape from mistake by adding ' two other of His disciples ' without mentioning their names. Some questions may be suggested. Is not the statement in v. 3 abrupt ? Is not an explanation needed for the presence of these disciples in Galilee, and for their return to the calling which at the bidding of Jesus they had forsaken ? Is not also the restoration of Peter to his apostleship unduly delayed ? Would he after his denial have resumed his place in the apostolic company without such restoration ? (2) We seem compelled to find in vv. 1-14 a tradition which we have no means of authenticating, or putting, if authentic, into its proper context, unless we accept Luke's setting as at least possible, which the writer THE APPENDIX 33 of the Appendix has with honest intention, if mistaken judgment, adopted as the occasion for the tender and touching talk of Jesus with Peter in vv. 15-19, linking the two separate stories together by the explanation in v. 15a, ' So when they had broken their fast.' For this conversation a context at once suggests itseK. On their return the two disciples who had seen the Lord were told that He had appeared to Simon (Luke xxiv. 34) ; and Paul mentions an appearance to Cephas (1 Cor. xv. 5). What more probable than that Jesus among His very earliest appearances should show HimseK to the penitent disciple to comfort and restore him ? The place of the appearance would be Jerusalem, and the time the day of Resurrection. The statement in v. 18 need not be treated as a pro phecy after the event, as xiii. 36 indicates that Jesus anticipated that Peter would thereafter be faithful unto death, an anticipation which must be considered, as must all prophecy, as conditional. Such a pre diction is surely not beyond the range of the foresight we may ascribe to the earthly Jesus even, not to say the heavenly Christ. Mr. Thompson denies that the saying in v. 18 has any reference to martyrdom. It is a description of an old man's helplessness in needing to be dressed and carried about. It is to be figuratively interpreted of ' the life of penitent and obedient discipleship which had not been possible for him at an earlier period in his spiritual development, when he preferred to be his own master and to go his own way.' Verse 23 must, in accordance with the contrast between Peter and the beloved disciple, receive a similar figurative interpretation. ' Jesus' promise is not that one of His disciples shall live to extreme old age, and witness the coming of the Messiah,_but that spiritual insight and faith, the ma^J^e^ti^e)di^ipi&s 34 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE ship, as personified in the beloved disciple, shall never die out of the Church, and shall never lose their reward in the experience of the living presence of Christ.1 This exposition is, however, too subtle to be at all convincing, and does not accord with the general character of this Appendix. (3) If the whole Appendix is treated as a tendency writing with little, if any, contact with tradition, and with a skiKul working up of materials suggested by the Fourth Gospel itseK, as Dr. Strachan seeks to show in an elaborate argument which does not, however, command assent,2 there is no difficulty in connecting vv. 20-23 with vv. 15-19. But it is here at least suggested that vv. 15-19 contain a tradition of Jesus' appearance to Peter on two grounds : (a) that it is probable that Jesus did restore Peter to apostle ship after his denial before he resumed the prominent position he holds according to the record in Acts ; (6) that it is preferable to ascribe to the writer an adaptation of a tradition rather than free invention, if that charge can be at all avoided. If vv. 20-22 also rest on a tradition, they must have belonged originally to another context, as it is not likely that if the witness had been present when Christ appeared to Peter, as testified by Luke and Paul, the Gospel would have contained no account of the appearance. If the saying of v. 22 was current, it is not improbable that the writer of the Appendix in his own mind connected it with this occasion, even if there was no tradition to that effect. Jesus' saying in Mark ix. 1, ' There be some here of them that stand by which shall in no wise taste of , death, till they see the Kingdom of God come with power,' was probably the ground for the 1 The Expositor, 8th series, vol. xiv. pp. 226-229. 2 Op. cit. vol. vii. pp. 255 ff. THE APPENDIX 35 expectation that one of the original disciples would survive to the Parousia. What more inevitable than that the expectation should attach itseK to the only survivor known in the circles where it was current. The death (probably recent) of the beloved disciple seemed to give the lie to the promise of Jesus, and the writer of the Appendix seeks to save the veracity of Jesus. But Jesus' saying in v. 22 may be interpreted in two ways. Either the emphasis is to be laid on if I will (eav 0e\w) or on tarry or abide (ixiveiv). In the first case Jesus is represented as simply affirming that it lay in His power to preserve the disciple till the Second Advent without any pledge that the power would be used. In the second case /leveiv must be interpreted in accord with the use of the word fiovai in xiv. 2. ' In his interpretation of iieveiv,' says Strachan, ' he seeks to save the veracity of our Lord by implying that Jesus actually contemplated the death of John when He so spoke, and meant that the disciple would abide in the intermediate state until the Parousia, when, with the other saints who inhabited the fiovai of the Father's house (xiv. 2) he would be received into glory.' The first explanation seems adequate, and the second rather far-fetched. The recent death is presupposed, and, as Strachan argues, ' the passage presents extreme difficulty to those who hold the theory of the early martyrdom of John.' 1 The way in which Dr. Moffatt seeks to remove the difficulty 2 need not now detain us, as it does not exist for those who do not identify the beloved disciple with John the son of Zebedee.3 If the writer of the Appendix had heard this tradition of the early martyr dom, and because of his identification of the beloved 1 Op. cit. pp. 269-271. 2 Introduction, pp. 575-576. 3 To this point we shall afterwards return. 36 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE disciple with John disbelieved it, he was .confronted with a difficulty in the saying of Jesus to James and John which appeared to be a prophecy of their martyr dom, ' The cup that I drink ye shall drink ; and with the baptism that I am baptized withal shall ye be baptized ' (Mark x. 39). He seems to meet it in v. 24. There was recognized a ' white ' as well as a ' red ' martyrdom, a witness in continued life as well as in IKe surrendered to death. The Gospel was ' the martyrdom ' of the beloved disciple. (4) Dr. Stanton's conclusion regarding the authorship of the Appendix is this : ' Although, therefore, ch. xxi. was by a different hand from chs. i.-xx., there appears to be no good ground for interposing a long interval between the composition of the one and the other.' x He opposes Bacon's view that the Appendix was added to the Gospel and that it was re-edited with insertions from the Synoptic tradition in the middle of the second century on the ground that some traces of the earlier form of the Gospel would have remained.2 He argues that if, as Bacon contends, the purpose of the Appendix and the other changes introduced into the Gospel was to ' commend it to Roman Christians, whose views as to the Gospel narrative and as to a Petrine supremacy had been moulded by Mark,' he should have done his work in so tentative a way. ' How could such extremely slight adjustments to the Synoptic story have satisfied those who were wedded to it 1 How could such obscure indications of the personafity of the evangelist have served to establish the Johannine authorship.' 3 It may be that Dr. Bacon ascribes to the redactor of the Gospel, as he calls him, too ambitious a design. For whatever 1 The Gospels as Historical Documents, part iii. p. 27. 2 Op. cit. p. 23. 3 Ov. cit. p. 27. THE APPENDIX 37 reason the passages which he assigns to the redactor were inserted, they do break the continuity of the evangelist's record, and may be regarded, mostly, if not all, as later additions. The Appendix does afford a starting-point for an investigation of what may be called the Synoptic elements in the Gospel, and we are justified in inquiring what are the passages which may be assigned to the writer of the Appendix. IV THE REDACTOR'S INSERTIONS One of the problems of the Fourth Gospel, difficult to solve, is its relations to the Synoptics. With the general problem we are now not concerned, but only with those passages which have Synoptic parallels, or appear as Synoptic echoes. Stanton expresses the opinion that ' the parallels with St. Mark certainly seem to afford evidence of an amount and kind suffi cient to prove that the fourth evangelist knew that Gospel fairly well.'1 Parallels, unless so close as to prove literary dependence, may be explained by access to a common tradition. Differences disprove literary dependence, unless good reason can be shown for the changes introduced. The writer is convinced that the parallels are not close enough to prove, and that the differences are great enough to disprove, literary dependence. But the main objection against assuming that either the witness or the evangelist knew St. Mark is that such knowledge would have modified the contents of the Gospel to a greater extent ; and that the handling of St. Mark in the Gospel must on such an assumption appear altogether arbitrary, putting a strain on the scholar's ingenuity in finding reasons for omissions, additions, or modifications. If it can be shown, as the writer believes that it can, that the Synoptic elements are due to a redactor, and bear the marks of insertions interrupting the context, a diffi- 1 The Gospels as Historical Documents, part iii. p. 220. 38 THE REDACTOR'S INSERTIONS 39 culty is removed ; and we need not ascribe either to the evangelist or to the witness an unintelligible treatment of one of the Synoptic Gospels. As it is from the Synoptic tradition, if not one of the Synoptic Gospels, that the redactor's interest in John the son of Zebedee is derived, we may include under the present heading the first of the insertions to which attention may be called. (1) Eager as is the redactor to establish the trust worthiness of the witness, and to identify him with John the son of Zebedee, we need not hesitate in assign ing to him the attestation, and even protestation, of xix. 35, ' And he that saw it bare record, and his record is true ; and he knoweth that he saith true, that ye might believe.' There is ground for the assumption that the redactor in inserting the last clause had the statement of the purpose of the Gospel in xx. 31 before his mind, and wrote from the same motive as in xxi. 24. The significance the evangelist finds in the incident (v. 34) is indicated in v. 36. But the redactor may have been thinking of 1 John v. 6, 8, although that passage does not necessarily refer to this statement, but more probably to the Baptism and the Passion. The conclusion that this is ' an early marginal gloss of editorial character ' x is supported by the textual evidence dealt with by Blass. (2) The interest shown in the Appendix in Peter's restoration to apostleship leads us to raise the question whether other references to Peter may not be from the hands of the redactor. (i) Would he not be likely to insert the story of the denial ? When we turn to the record in chapter xviii. we find general agreement that there has been a dis- 1 See Bacon, The Fourth Gospel, pp. 461-462. 40 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE location. Why is the story of Peter told in two parts, vv. 15-18 and vv. 25-27 ? Is the high priest referred to in v. 19 Annas or Caiaphas ? Verses 13 and 24 would indicate Caiaphas ; but if Caiaphas examined Jesus in the house of Annas, why did Annas send Jesus bound to Caiaphas (v. 24) to undergo presumably another examination. Even if the high priest was Annas, since he bears that title in Acts iv. 6, and shares it with Caiaphas in Luke iii. 2, why after the examination was Jesus sent to Caiaphas ? Dr. Moffatt * inserts vv. 19-24 between 14 and 15, and so makes vv. 15-18 continuous with vv. 25-27, while omitting 25a as a repetition of 18c, thus restoring the unity of the story of Peter's denial. But as this arrangement still requires us to assume that the high priest in «. 19 is Caiaphas the difficulty about v. 24 remains, and can only be removed if v. 24 be placed before v. 19. Such dislocation is surely an indication that the original text has been interfered with by an unskiKul redactor. For such a conclusion other reasons may be offered. If vv. 15, 16 come from the redactor it is one of those indications of his desire to identify the author of the Gospel, but as these verses have no Synoptic parallel, it is more probable that they belong to the evangelist's record, and go back to the witness's indications of his own identity. If the other disciple was within while Peter was without the court he would not be an eye-witness of the denial ; and since, as will afterwards be shown, the witness probably confined himseK to what he had seen and heard, the story is not likely to have come from him, but from another source. The redactor may have got it either directly or indirectly from one of the Synoptic Gospels. As will be shown in the course of the argument, what may be called Synoptic echoes are 1 The New Testament, p. 139. THE REDACTOR'S INSERTIONS 41 less likely to be due to the witness or the evangelist than to the redactor. (ii) If the story of the denial is from the redactor's hand, can Peter's boast and Jesus' warning in xiii. 36- 38 be explained in the same way ? Here too scholars find dislocations. Dr. Moffatt1 places chaps, xv. and xvi. after the middle of xiii. 31, and xiii. 316-38 after xvi. 33 and before xiv. 1. But the exultation of Spirit expressed in vv. 31-32 would seem more probable immediately after the departure of the betrayer ; and it is at least as probable that chaps, xv. and xvi. should follow vv. 35.2 Verses 36-38 (which now alone concern us, although the probability of so large a dislocation confirms the argument to be offered) would more appropriately follow Jesus' statement in v. 33, and how fittingly would xv. 1-8 follow v. 35. Again this seems to be a Synoptic parallel which the redactor has put in the wrong place. It is possible that it took Peter some time to realize the import of Jesus' words, and that he interrupted at a point unsuitable for his question ; but on the whole the continuity of Jesus' speech is but maintained by placing vv. 36-38 after 33. (iii) Guided by the threefold clue, interest in Peter, dislocation, Synoptic parallel or echo, we are brought next to vi. 66-71. That the whole chapter should be placed before chapter v. and that vii. 15-24 should be joined to chapter v. will be argued in the subsequent discussion ; meanwhile this passage may be assumed to be part of a larger dislocation. As the whole chapter is intended as a summary of the course of the ministry in Galilee, this passage may be regarded as the counter part of the Confession at Caesarea Philippi (Matt. xvi. 13-20). The redactor is more remote from the Synoptic 1 The New Testament, pp. 134-138. 2 See Wendt, op. cit. p. 104. 42 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE tradition here than in some Synoptic parallels ; and we may rather call it an echo ; the voice is, as it were, more confused. Peter is here also in the middle of the stage as the Confessor. The differences from the Synoptic records deserve notice. Firstly, as the Gospel had already recorded (i. 41, 45, 49) franker and fuller confessions of the Messiahship of Jesus at the beginning of the ministry than any which the Synoptists record, it is not a confession of the Messiahship that is reported. The conception of the situation is that there is danger of relapse from the faith already attained (v. 67). Secondly, as the interest of the Gospel is in the truth taught by Jesus, the confession runs : ' Thou hast the words of eternal life ' (v. 68) ; words which, so far as Peter is revealed to us by the Synoptists, are not likely to have fallen from his lips. The next phrase, ' the Holy One of God ' (v. 69), is nearer the Synoptic lan guage. Thirdly, the anticipation of Judas' betrayal is antedated, as in the Synoptic tradition a reference to betrayal occurs only in the Second Announcement of the Passion (Mark ix. 31), although it is possible that the First Announcement of the Passion (viii. 31) pro duced a revulsion of feeling in Judas, which Jesus at once detected. It is not at all probable, however, that if Jesus at once uttered a word of warning, it would be put in the terms of v. 70. Can this verse possibly be an echo of the rebuke of Peter, ' Get thee behind me, Satan ' (Mark viii. 33) ? Did tradition confuse the rebuke of Peter with the exposure of Judas ? (iv) The preceding passage (vi. 60-65) has also some Synoptic affinities. Verse 65 recalls to us the saying of Jesus to Peter : ' Flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven ' (Matt. xvi. 17). The contrast in v. 63 between the THE REDACTOR'S INSERTIONS 43 spirit and the flesh pervades the teaching of Jesus about what defileth (Matt. xv. 1-20). The hard saying (v. 60) need not be the preceding discourse in John, but rather that teaching (cf. Matt. xv. 12). Verse 62 is absolutely inappropriate and irrelevant in its present context. It connects itseK with the circle of sayings in iii. 13-15 and xii. 20-36, which will receive a fuller consideration in the subsequent discussion. The whole passage is disconnected. It is intended to describe the crisis in Galilee, which Jesus' withdrawal ' into the parts of Tyre and Sidon ' indicates as having taken place soon after the feeding of the five thousand (Matt. xv. 21). The reference to the betrayal in v. 64, K it means a dateless knowledge, is an instance of the tendency already indicated in the evangelist himseK to exaggerate the supernaturalness of Jesus' know ledge. Verse 65 has a partial, if not complete, resem blance to Matt. xi. 25-27. An assertion of such entire dependence on God in His work agrees with the Synoptic representation. (3) We must now confront the difficult problem of the rest of the sixth chapter. Even K this narrative were to be traced to the evangelist or to the witness, there is evidence that it is not the story of an eye witness, but a second-hand report, not even derived from a written Gospel. One of our three clues — the interest in Peter — is absent, but the other two, Synoptic echoes and dislocation, are present, (a) We need not assume, however, that the redactor was interested only in Peter among the Twelve. Importance would be attached, in the circles to which he desired to com mend the Gospel, to the Twelve, as his endeavour to identify the beloved disciple with John the son of Zebedee shows. Philip and Andrew appear in a prominent position here, as also they do in the passage 44 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE xii. 20-36, which will later be shown to consist also of Synoptic echoes. Nowhere in the account of the visits to Jerusalem do any of these disciples appear by name until the last in the Passion week. We are justified in thus recovering our missing clue by an extension of the interest from Peter to the Twelve. (6) That chapter vi. should precede chapter v. may be shown for the following reasons. The statement in iv. 54 that Jesus had ' come out of Judaea into Galilee ' suggests at least that Jesus had left Judaea to exercise His ministry for a time in Galilee ; but v. 1, without giving any adequate reason, takes Him away again to Judaea. But if there had been a crisis in Galilee, it was needful for Him to withdraw HimseK. On this visit He seems to have been alone (v. 1, no disciples are mentioned as accompanying Him from Galilee), and to have been for a time unknown (vv. 13-15). In iv. 46 He is in Cana in Galilee, and is appealed to by a nobleman from Capernaum. In vi. 1 He is represented as going over the sea of Galilee, a more appropriate description if He was already on one side of the sea than if He was in Jerusalem where v. 47 leaves Him. The statement in vii. 1 also foUows more appropriately after the account of the visit to Jerusalem in v., and the reference in vv. 16 and 18 to the extreme hostility of the Jews. We should also, as has already been indicated, restore vii. 15-24 to its original position in the Gospel after v. 47, as the reference throughout is to the Cure on the Sabbath. The order of events, then, would be that Jesus, after the miracle of Cana (iv. 46-54), for a time continued His ministry in Galilee (vi.) ; that after the crisis there He went alone to Jerusalem, probably at the Pente cost (v. 1) following the Passover (vi. 4) ; that He was compelled by Jewish hostility (v. 1-47, vii. 15-24) to THE REDACTOR'S INSERTIONS 45 return to Galilee (vii. 1), but visited Jerusalem again at the Feast of Tabernacles (v. 10). A confirmation of this order of events is suggested by the indefinite reference in v. 1 to ' a feast of the Jews ' or ' as many ancient authorities read, the feast ' (R.V. marg.). If in the original Pentecost was mentioned, and chapters v. and vi. were transposed, the Passover would be mentioned between Pentecost and the Feast of Taber nacles, and the indefinite reference might be an attempt to get out of a chronological difficulty. The witness was too familiar himseK with Jewish affairs not to be able to name this feast. (c) Additional reasons for the redactor's insertion of this account of the Galilaean ministry may be suggested. He may have desired to contrast the enthusiasm of Galilee, however mistaken, with the hostility of Judaea, and to heighten the impression of Peter's fidelity by contrasting it with the de sertions which followed even that enthusiasm in Galilee. (d) Before going any further in our analyses of this chapter we may compare the narrative in vv. 1-21 with the Synoptic record. The story in Mark vi. 30-44 offers an altogether more probable explanation of the occasion of the miracle. Jesus, absorbed in His teaching, moved thereto by His compassion, needs to be reminded by His disciples that the people have been all day without food, and that it will be desirable to dismiss them before nightfall. The record in John bears far less the marks of historical probability, and shows clearly the pragmatism of the Gospel. Is it probable that as soon as Jesus saw the multitude coming to Him, He began to be concerned about how they should be fed (v. 5) ? Is not this situation more artificial and less natural than that presented in Mark ? 46 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE Again, v. 6 is written from the standpoint of a later Christology, and accords with other passages in em phasizing the supernaturalness of Jesus' knowledge beyond what seem the necessary limitations of a real incarnation. That after the disciples had brought the perilous position before Jesus He put such a question to Philip is not improbable, nor that Andrew offered the information about the five barley loaves and two fishes. This statement is given, however, in a doctrinal rather than a historical setting. (e) It is not improbable that the multitude did follow Jesus to the other side of the lake, and that a conversation bearing on the miracle did take place, although it is strange that the Synoptists, Mark and Matthew, have no record of it. Luke does not come into consideration here, for he passes at once from the feeding of the five thousand to the Confession at Caesarea Philippi (ix. 17-18). Does not the summary of the ministry in Gennesaret (Mark vi. 53-56) in its lack of precise details suggest the possibility that either some of the disciples, in their disappointment, for a time withdrew from their Master, or were sent away by Him in order to allay the popular excitement, and were not with Him at the time referred to here ? It is difficult to suppose, however, that Jesus on this occasion delivered the discourse as it is recorded. The language and the thought are distinctive of the Fourth Gospel, and not of the Synoptic reports of the teaching of Jesus. The conversation at the seashore and the controversy in the synagogue are combined, and it is too easy a solution of the last difficulty to suppose that the conversation ends with v. 40, and the controversy begins at v. 41. ' The unexpected h> avvaywyfi of vi, 59 coming after vi, 25 and vi. 30 after THE REDACTOR'S INSERTIONS 47 vi. 14 suggest a conflation of two traditions.' x ' Chastand,' 2 says Moffatt, ' distinguishes a speech in the synagogue (vi. 28-30, 36-40, 43-46) from one by the seaside (vi. 26-27, 31-35, 41-42, 47-58).' Before considering this analysis, however, another solution of the problem may be suggested. (/) Two audiences are distinguished, a great multitude (v. 2), the people (v. 14), the multitude (v. 22), and the Jews (vv. 41 and 52). The multitude was addressed on the seashore (v. 24) and the controversy with the Jews took place in the synagogue at Capernaum (v. 59). Assuming that this is correct, who were the Jews ? The answer is offered by Mark vii. 1, ' And there gathered together unto Him the Pharisees, and certain of the scribes, which had come from Jeru salem.' If these opponents were not Galilaeans but Judaeans, the nature of the controversy with them can be more easily understood, for Jesus was then dealing with the same kind of opponents as He dealt with in Jerusalem. These enemies would thus in some measure be responsible for Jesus' loss of popu larity even in Galilee. If we can thus regard the two references in John vi. 41, 52, and the one reference in Mark vii. 3, as not to Galilaeans, but to Judaeans, then we are warranted in affirming that the term Jews is not applied to Galilaeans anywhere in the Gospels, but is always used either of Judaeans in contrast with Galilaeans, or of the Jewish nation as a whole. The writer does not profess an adequate knowledge of the contemporary Jewish literature to affirm whether this is in accord with the more general practice, or may be regarded as a peculiarity of the Gospels. The 1 Moffatt's Introduction to the Literature of the New Testament, p. 554. 2 L'ap§tre Jean et le quatrieme ivangile, pp. 241 ff. 48 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE problem of the contrast between the subjects and manner of controversy between Jesus and His op ponents as recorded in the Synoptics and the Fourth Gospel may not be solved ; but its difficulty is some what mitigated if in John vi. Jesus is confronting in Galilee His Judaean opponents. Otherwise we cannot appeal to the difference of place, Galilee in the one case, Judaea in the other, for an explanation of the contrast between the Synoptics and the Fourth Gospel. (gr) But another solution of the problem has been suggested to the mind of the writer as at least more probable. There may have been a conversation at the seashore with the multitude, and a controversy in the synagogue with the Jews, who may have been those referred to in Mark vii. 1, but it does not follow that what is before us is an exact report of what was spoken on each of these occasions. For, having got his historical framework, the redactor may have fitted into it a discourse that he found in the Gospel without any definite historical setting. In that case we might assume that the conversation extended to the end of v. 29. The request for a sign in v. 30 would come very strangely from the multitude which had just witnessed the miracle (vv. 1-14). To the contro versy vv. 41-45 may refer, although the reason given for the controversy in v. 41 is doubtful, if Jesus had not called HimseK on this occasion, ' the bread which came down out of heaven.' Verse 42 would certainly be more likely to be spoken in Galilee than in Jeru salem, and seems an echo of Matt. xiii. 55. As it is held by many scholars that vii. 15-24 should follow v. 47, is it not possible that a discourse on the Bread of Life may belong to that place, between vv. 14 and 25, a discourse which the redactor has distributed THE REDACTOR'S INSERTIONS 49 between the seashore and the synagogue as an appropriate sequel to the miracle. This he did unskil fully, as an analysis will show. As the Feast of Taber nacles was associated with the Wanderings in the Wilderness, such a demand as vi. 30-31 contains would be much more probable in Jerusalem on that occasion than in its present context. Thus would be explained the disorder in the report of the conversation and the controversy and also the peculiar character of the teaching, unlikely to have been given in Galilee. (h) As this is offered only as a conjecture, we may look more closely at the passage to examine the possibility of such teaching having been given on this occasion. Chastand refers vv. 28-30 to the controversy in the synagogue, but it has already been suggested that vv. 28 and 29 would not be inappropriate as addressed to the multitude at the seashore. For an alternative explanation of vv. 30-31 we might recall Mark viii. 11, where a similar demand is recorded after the feeding of the Four Thousand. If that passage (viii. 1-10) is a variant tradition of vi. 30-44, then possibly the redactor with his second-hand knowledge of the Galilaean ministry may have introduced this incident at what seemed by association of ideas the proper place. Verse 33 is evidently a theological reflexion, but vv. 32, 34, 35 might be the substance of a conversation with the people. Verses 36-40 seem to contain teaching far too advanced for the multitude, and may belong to the controversy with the Jewish opponents. Unlikely even in that setting is the phrase in v. 38, ' down from heaven,' as also so plain a reference to His power in raising from the dead at the last day (vv. 39-40 ; cf. v. 19-29), which appears to go beyond the claim which from His other teaching we conclude He ever made for HimseK, at least in the D 50 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE present context, although at a later date He may have challenged Jewish unbelief by such an assertion. Chastand ascribes vv. 41 and 42 to the multitude, but this is unlikely for three reasons. Firstly, a distinction seems to be intended between the multitude and the Jews. The Judaean opponents would make any claim Jesus made to the multitude a ground of con troversy on the first convenient occasion. Secondly, would the multitude, after having been fed, murmur at such a claim ? Lastly, v. 42 recalls Mark vi. 3, and comes from another context. Verses 43-46 may belong to the controversy in the synagogue, and what has been said above in reference to vv. 36-40 applies here also. In vv. 47-50 possibly we return to the seashore, as the thought is continuous with v. 35 ; but v. 50 looks like a later reflexion, and the last clause of v. 51 makes us pause. Would Jesus at this time refer to His giving His flesh for the life of the world ? Is it likely that He would make even an obscure allusion to His death when dealing with the multitude before He had made any announcement of His coming Passion to his own disciples ? The allusion to the flesh is developed in vv. 52-57 ; but the thought of vv. 32-35 is resumed in v. 58. Chastand assigns vv. 47-58 to the conversations at the seashore, but this seems impossible. The last clause of v. 51 and vv. 52-57 belong to another context. Possibly Jesus may in the Upper Room to some of His disciples, K not all, have expanded the thought implied in the words of institution of the Supper, but more probably there is here the reflexion of a later time, possibly due to controversy regarding the Eucharist.1 We may now in the light of this analysis 1 For a treatment of the question from this standpoint see The Fourth Gospel and the Sacraments, by John Naish. (The Expositor, 8th series, vol. xxiii. pp. 53-68.) THE REDACTOR'S INSERTIONS 51 reconsider our conjecture. It is more probable that the redactor had not an independent tradition before him ; but that as this teaching has so close affinities with the other discourses in the Fourth Gospel, that was the source ; he used his material unskilfully. (i) It does not seem necessary, however, to abandon the historical character of the narrative, and to sub ordinate it so completely to the doctrinal interest as is done in the following statement by Dr. Strachan.1 ' The mysterious appearance of Jesus is thus made prominent, and it is for this reason in particular that the evangelist uses this story, along with the previous one, as a prelude to the eucharistic narrative. Note also the rather elaborate and involved statement, vv. 22-25, intended to point out that Jesus could not have arrived by a boat, and culminating in the wondering question of the crowd at His sudden appearance (v. 25). What is the connexion of all this with the Eucharist ? The evangelist seeks to teach that Jesus is able to transcend the laws of space, and that His presence is to be looked for elsewhere than only in the eucharistic meal. The storm-tossed ship symbolizes the Church, and Jesus communicates HimseK to its needs in a fashion that transcends limitations of sense. In our interpretation, the chapter refers to exaggerated ideas, current when the Gospel was written, as to the exclusive presence of Jesus in the Eucharist. Not only in the Eucharist, but amid the storms of fife does Jesus appear. He is a real spiritual presence everywhere.' The writer must confess that all this is too ingenious and arbitrary to be convincing. (j) Although the conjecture has been adopted that in this chapter in the parts indicated in the analysis we have a discourse of Jesus included by the evangelist, 1 The Fourth Gospel, p. 119. 52 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE but re-edited by the redactor, the occasion of which was possibly the Feast of Tabernacles ; yet in order to avoid a return in a subsequent chapter a few words on the theological significance may be added. Jesus demands faith of the multitude on the ground that He alone can offer men the absolute satisfaction of their needs, because He comes from God, and brings God's resources to men. This one thought is repeated again and again, and this repetition may be due to the witness's reflexions rather than his reminiscences. He turned over in his mind a pregnant saying of Jesus. The subtle distinctions which Bishop Westcott observes 1 seem to show only a misplaced subtlety ; for an effective popular teacher, as Jesus was, does not make them. In His reply to His opponents Jesus affirms the impossibility of His being understood and believed except by those who have experienced an inward change (vv. 44-45). It is the same demand as He made of Nicodemus (iii. 3, 5), and the same assurance as He gave Peter (Matt. xvi. 17). Next He affirms that He knows God as no other has known Him (v. 46). The same claim is made in Matt. xi. 27. He reproaches His hearers with having failed to exercise the faith in Him which their knowledge of Him warranted (v. 36), and explains their failure, not as due to any unfaithful ness on His part to His calling, but as proving that they have not experienced this inward change (vv. 37-40). We may here note a contrast between Jesus' standpoint and ours. We lay stress on the subjective process in man of unbelief or faith, He lays stress on the objective purpose of God (as in Matt. xi. 27). For Him the inward change is a divine gKt (vv. 37, 39). But we should misrepresent His mind K we considered that there was anything arbitrary in the exercise of the 1 The Gospel of St. John, pp. 99 ff. THE REDACTOR'S INSERTIONS 53 divine will or any disregard of the exercise of the human will, for v. 40 makes this plain. God gives to Christ all who choose to know Him and trust in Him. On an intelligent interpretation there is in this teaching no moral dualism or fatalism, as though God doomed any man to inevitable unbelief, and so to consequent condemnation. In the address to the disciples, or a few of them (51c, 52-57), the figurative language here ascribed to Jesus would be startling had He not in the institution of the Supper compared His body to the bread, and His blood to the wine which He called on His disciples to partake. These sayings, if not the reflexions of a later age, can be understood only as an expansion of the words of institution. We need not follow Westcott in his far too subtle exposition, as when he writes : ' " Flesh " describes human nature in its totality regarded from its earthly side. . . . The thought of death lies already in the word, but that thought is not as yet brought out, as afterwards, by the addition of blood.' * What the passage teaches can be put quite simply. The soul's sustenance and satis faction is found only in Christ by faith in Him, and in Him not only as living, teaching, working, but as dying, as offering HimseK in sacrifice for the world's salvation. If the words are in some sense Christ's, to read later eucharistic ideas into them is to indulge in dogmatic, and not historical, exegesis. If they are the reflexions of a later age, such interpretation could claim justifica tion. Interpreted in the setting of the Last Supper, the passage would not be inharmonious with Jesus' other teaching about His sacrifice. Without affirming that all the perplexities of chapter vi. have by this treatment been resolved, the writer is convinced that only on such lines can the problem be solved at all. 1 Op. cit. p. 106. 54 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE (4) It is quite uncertain whether the account of the second visit to Cana in Galilee (iv. 43-54) is to be ascribed to the redactor or to the witness, (a) If the incident belongs to the public ministry in Galilee, and should be directly attached to chapter vi., it is not likely, for reasons elsewhere given, that the witness was present. If, however, it preceded the formation of the Galilaean company of disciples, of whom he was not one, he may have been. Even K he were not present, his reason for recording it at second-hand may have been his interest in the place itseK, awakened by the previous visit (ii. 1-11). As Mary the mother of Jesus had a connexion with Cana (ii. 1), she, who afterwards made her home with him (xix. 27), may have been his informant. If the story is to be ascribed to the redactor, it is possible to regard it as a variant of the Synoptic story of the healing of the centurion's servant (Matt. viii. 5-13) with an exaggeration of the super natural character of the cure as wrought at a distance. This, however, is by no means necessary. For the difference between the distance from Cana to Caper naum and the distance from the spot where Jesus was where He spoke the word of assurance to the centurion's house in Capernaum cannot really be supposed to in crease the supernaturalness of the act of healing. If Jesus' miracles were answers to His prayers, as xi. 41 suggests, distance would make no difference to the omnipresent God. Only if we regard the miracles as due to moral therapeutics can we consider the personal presence of Jesus as essential. It is from the modern scholar's standpoint, and not from the witness's or the redactor's, that the one kind of cure would appear more miraculous than the other. On account of the character of the miracle we need not assign the record to the redactor rather than the witness. On the whole THE REDACTOR'S INSERTIONS 55 the writer himself inclines to ascribe the story to the witness. (b) A difficulty emerges in v. 44. Does it mean that Jesus HimseK quoted the proverb, ' A prophet hath no honour in his own country,' as He did on another occasion (Matt. xiii. 57) in reference to Nazareth ' His own country ' (v. 54) as a reason for leaving Judaea and going into Galilee, or did Jesus' action in the judgment of the witness in so doing confirm the truth of the proverb ? In other words, are we to interpret the words from the standpoint of Jesus or of the wit ness. If from the former, the conclusion would be inevitable that Jesus meant by His own country Galilee, but that would be a reason for leaving Galilee, and not for returning to it. On the lips of Jesus at the beginning of His ministry, when He had not yet tested the feeling of Galilee, the words would be inappropriate as they are not on the other occasion. If from the latter standpoint, then the words reveal the witness's con viction which he may have transferred to Jesus that Jesus as Jewish Messiah, wherever His early home may have been, properly belonged to Judaea, and this intensified the tragedy of His having to turn from Judaea to Galilee. ' It looks,' says Dr. Strachan, ' as though the Evangelist regarded Judaea, and not Galilee, as " the country " of Jesus, which of course is wrong.' x In view of the explanation offered is it ' of course wrong ' ? A parallel thought is in i. 11 : 'He came unto His own place (to. i&ia) and His own people (ot t'Stot) received Him not.' For in this respect probably the evangelist would share the witness's standpoint. Does not such a touch indicate a Judaean and not a Galilaean ? 2 1 The Fourth Gospel, p. 110. 2 Bacon's suggestion that the words <£W ot)/c clariKBev ch Nafap^r have fallen out between vv. 43 and 44 would supply a good explana tion. (The Expositor, 8th series, vol. xxiii. p. 42.) 56 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE (c) The answer of Jesus to the request (v. 48) suggests that He was unwilling to repeat in Galilee the kind of ministry which had proved so fruitless in Judaea, the working of miracles which evoked an untrustworthy belief (ii. 23-25). If we now turn to Mark i. 14 for the continuation of the story after v. 54, we may infer that Jesus' plan was to avoid the working of miracles as far as possible, and to undertake with a few chosen companions a preaching tour in the synagogues of Galilee (v. 38). For this work the two pairs of brothers were first called (vv. 16-20) and then Matthew (ii. 14) ; and the witness as a Judaean returned to Jerusalem to rejoin Jesus on His subsequent visits. (5) One other passage falls to be considered as a probable insertion by the redactor. It is the interview with the Greeks and the discourse of Jesus on that occasion (xii. 20-36). (a) The request of the Greeks is reported, and the response of Jesus ; but there is no record of the interview if it did take place. Dr. Strachan comments on this : ' Our interest is fixed not on the historical fact, but on its significance. These Greeks are symbolic of the world-wide significance of the death of Jesus. This meaning is brought out in the discourse that follows.' x But may not the his torical fact have suggested to the mind of Jesus HimseK the subsequent train of thought ? In view of the Synoptic echoes in what follows we may ask whether such an interview would not be more likely on the borders of Galilee as at Caesarea Philippi than in Jerusalem. If it was the redactor who placed a tradi tion of such an interview where it now is, v. 20 would be his explanation of the assumed presence of these Greeks in Jerusalem. Philip and Andrew again come into prominence as in chap. vi. 1 Op. cit. p. 159. THE REDACTOR'S INSERTIONS 57 (6) We must now examine each verse. Verse 23 is characteristically Johannine in form, but may be genuine, K not in this context. (Cf . xiii. 31.) Verse 24 sounds an authentic utterance of Jesus, suitable to such an occasion. The possibility of a wider ministry to the Gentiles suggested by the request of the Greeks is set aside in view of the necessity of His death. He must die as Jewish Messiah before He can become the world's Saviour. Dr. Strachan x here again comments : ' Note that the analogy of the death of the corn of wheat is peculiarly suitable to Greek thought.' Was it not just as probable for the mind of Jesus HimseK, who spoke the parable of the Sower ? Paul was more familiar with streets than with fields, and he uses the same analogy (1 Cor. xv. 36). Do not vv. 25 and 26 recall Mark viii. 34-38 modified by the channel of transmission ? We cannot but think of Gethsemane, of the agony in which the Fourth Gospel has no record, as we read vv. 27 and 28. The voice from heaven recalls the experiences of the Baptism and the Trans figuration, although the possibility of some unusual mamfestation during Passion week cannot be excluded. But v. 30 must make us hesitate. It was not the method of Jesus to give signs from heaven ; and does not the voice as recorded in v. 28 give the response to the prayer. There is a contradiction here (compare for a similar misrepresentation, xi. 42). If we compare these verses with the Synoptic record of Gethsemane when Jesus left all but three chosen disciples behind, and even withdrew a little from them (Mark xiv. 32-35) when He prayed, it will seem incredible that He should have laid bare His soul before the multitude. Surely the sacred intimacies of Father and Son were not for profane ears to hear. An apologist's ardour here over- 1 Idem, p. 160, 58 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE comes love's insight. Verse 31 would most fitly follow v. 23, but it might also follow v. 24, as the Sacrifice of Jesus was the world's judgment and Satan's overthrow. In v. 32, which quite properly follows v. 31, Jesus Him seK probably intended a wider reference than is found in it in v. 33 ; and iii. 14, 15 would find a better setting here than in the conversation with Nicodemus. The question in v. 34, ' Who is this Son of man ? ' assumes that that title has just been mentioned — an additional reason for placing iii. 14, 15 here. The saying in vi. 62, which is out of place in its present context, could more suitably be placed here after v. 34, as it is just the kind of answer Jesus would give to such a question. Chapter iii. 13, 11, 12 would also fit in here, and such an arrange ment would give us a connected series of sayings. Verses 35-36 would offer quite an appropriate sequel to such teaching on whatever occasion it may have been given, concealing the truth from the indifferent and hostile, and yet revealing it to those who were able and willing to receive it.1 (c) As vv. 37-40 clearly should follow and not come 1 These sayings on the death and resurrection may be placed in succession : xii. 24, ' Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a grain of wheat fall into the earth and die, it abideth by itself alone ; but, if it die, it beareth much fruit.' Verses 31-32, ' Now is the judgment of this world ; now shall the prince of this world be cast out. And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto myself.' iii. 14, 15, ' As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up : that whosoever believeth may in Him have eternal Hfe.' xii. 34, ' The multitude therefore answered him, We have heard out of the law that the Christ abideth for ever ; and how sayest thou, The Son of man must be lifted up ? Who is this Son of man ? ' vi. 62, ' What then if ye should behold the Son of man ascending where he was before ? ' iii. 13, ' And no man hath ascended into heaven, but he that descended out of heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven. ' Verses 11-12,' Verily, verily, I say unto thee, We speak that we do know, and bear witness of that we have seen ; and ye receive not our witness. If I told you earthly things, and ye believe not, how shall ye believe if I tell you heavenly things ? ' We need not assume that nothing else was said and that all was said at the same time, THE REDACTOR'S INSERTIONS 59 before vv, 42-50, which would suitably follow v,. 19, this dislocation points here as elsewhere to the activities of the redactor. We cannot, however, assign the whole of this passage (vv. 20-36) as echoes of Synoptic tradi tion, as we must recognize Johannine elements in v. 23 and vv. 35-36. He may here, as in chapter vi., be con firming what he found in the Gospel with what he derived from some other source. Here his combination is unskfiful. The reason for such a series of sayings about the necessity of Jesus' death appears more probable at the close of His Galilaean ministry in the circle of His disciples than before the multitude, as v. 34, which betrays the redactor's standpoint, indicates. So scanty and bare are the indications about the Passion in the Synoptics that these sayings would form a welcome supplement to them, and the words about the lKting up would cover both the Crucifixion and subsequent Resurrection as there foretold. (6) The writer, while fully recognising a deep debt of gratitude to Dr. Bacon for the clue to these insertions, cannot regard as such some of the insertions he ascribes to the redactor. (i) ' Conspicuously is this the case with the interview with Nicodemus which Tatian's order, Synoptic affinity, and the intrinsic consistency of the Fourth Gospel alike require should stand after 7 : 30. This scene is linked by the editorial comment 2 : 23-25 to the inci dent of the Purging of the Temple 2 : 13-22, a passage which over and over again we have found evincing its alien origin. There was indeed nothing in the con tent of 3 : 1-21 to connect it with Passover : but it dealt with the doctrine of baptism, and this, it would seem, was enough for an editor in search of material for the additional Passover he had interjected into the 60 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE section on Jesus and the Baptist.' x The subsequent discussion will endeavour to prove that the historical framework of the Gospel can be accepted ; that there was a ministry in Judaea at the Passover, two years before the Passover of the Passion (the intervening Passover being referred to in vi. 4) ; that both the cleansing of the Temple and the conversation with Nicodemus belong to that period, and that if the repetition of the act of cleansing should appear in credible, the Johannine position is more probable than the Synoptic. Hence the writer cannot accept Bacon's confident conclusion, as it seems to him to rest on an insecure foundation. (ii) In a note he adds : ' We must also attribute to R the supplement to the Baptist's discourse in 3 : 31-36. This paragraph, of similar composition and style to 12 : 44-50, reiterates the thoughts and expressions of Jesus' discourse to Nicodemus, placing them now in the mouth of the Baptist ! ' The writer does not see a good reason for regarding xii. 44-50 other than as a report (reminiscence possibly mingled with reflexion) of what the witness said that Jesus had said. With iii. 31-36 he has already dealt as a reflexion or comment of either the evangelist or the witness, not on vv. 22-30, which have probably been displaced, but on iii. 1-21. Into any further considera tion of Bacon's views it is not necessary for the purpose of this volume to enter. Having with the help his dis cussion has offered sought to discover in the Gospel the contribution of the evangelist on the one hand and the redactor on the other, we come now to the most important part of the task, to ascertain and appraise what has come to us from the witness, ' the beloved disciple.' 1 Op. cit. pp. 523-524, V THE REMINISCENCES AND REFLEXIONS OF THE WITNESS : INTRODUCTORY (1) Having separated from the main contents of the Gospel the contributions of the evangelist and the redactor, we have now to examine the contribution of the witness. How far his report may have been affected by the evangelist in recording it we cannot accurately determine, neither can we rigidly fix the frontier between his own reminiscences and his re flexions, although sometimes the transition from the one to the other may be indicated with some degree of probability. In examining his contribution we may discover some of his characteristics, and thus gain some clues to his identity ; but the consideration of the authorship will be reserved for the close of the volume. (2) Before entering on this examination, it seems desirable that the course of the ministry of Jesus as presented in the Fourth Gospel by the witness should be sketched as the background of the seK-revelation of the Son of God which is its distinctive content. (i) The Baptist's testimony (i. 19-34) was followed by the call of the first disciples (35-51), and the con firmation of their faith in the first miracle at Cana (ii. 1-11). After a brief stay in Capernaum (v. 12), Jesus and His disciples came into the land of Judaea ; and there He exercised a ministry similar to John's. The jealousy of the Baptist's disciples evoked from 61 62 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE him an emphatic testimony to the superiority of the Messiah's work (iii. 22-30). The ministry in Jerusalem itseK was begun at the feast of the Passover by the Cleansing of the Temple, an act which aroused the antagonism of the priestly party (ii. 13-22). Although only a superficial impression was made on the common people (23-25), the Pharisaic party sent Nicodemus to discover whether this new movement should be encouraged or not ; but Jesus' demand of a thorough going change as a condition of discipleship was con temptuously rejected (iii. 1-10). The brief visit to Jerusalem had proved that the distinctive Messianic ministry could not yet be begun owing to the un- preparedness of the nation. To avoid any further dispute with John's disciples, Jesus withdrew even from Judaea itself to Galilee through Samaria, where He met with a promise of success, which, probably that He might not prejudice the chance of acceptance in Judaea or Galilee, He left to be fulfilled at a later time (iv. 1-23, 25-42). (ii) While it is not certain that the witness accom panied Jesus into Galilee (iv. 43-45), it is not im probable that he did visit Cana a second time, and so was present at the interview with the nobleman of Capernaum (46-54). But when the public ministry in Galilee began, and the Galilaean circle of disciples was formed, he returned to his home in Jerusalem. After a period in Galilee (the report of which is con tained in vi. 1-65) a second visit was paid to Jerusalem at a feast (v.). This feast was probably not the Passover (vi. 4) but Pentecost, fifty days later, as the excitement in Galilee (vi. 15) would have been fanned into a dangerous flame had Jesus gone up with the Galilaean pilgrims at once. The visit was a private one ; no disciples were with Him ; and the man cured REMINISCENCES OF THE WITNESS 63 did not know his benefactor (v. 13). His defence of the act of healing on the Sabbath day (v. 30-47 con tinued in vii. 15-24), referred not only to the immediate charge but to the relation to God which He claimed for HimseK. It was probably when the Galilaean ministry was again resumed that the confession at Caesarea Philippi of the Synoptic record, of which vi. 66-71 is an echo, took place. (iii) A third visit, ' not publicly, but as it were in secret,' was made at the Feast of Tabernacles (vii. 1-14) ; but publicity could not long be avoided, and in accordance with the ceremonial of the feast Jesus offered HimseK to the multitude, many of whom were now favourably inclined, as the Living Water (25-39). The divided state of public sentiment prevented the carrying out of the hostile designs of the priestly party (40-52). Jesus resumed His appeal to the people, and again in accord with the festival ritual offered HimseK as the Light of the World. He was driven in controversy with His opponents to make ever bolder claims for HimseK, until by asserting His pre-existence He excited such fury that an attempt was made to stone Him (viii. 12-59). (iv) Probably a retirement to Galilee at once took place ; but Jerusalem was again visited at the Feast of Dedication (x. 22). On this occasion the blind man received his sight (ix.), and Jesus had again to defend HimseK against the charge of Sabbath-breaking, and, as always, to assert the claims regarding His relation to God (x. 19-29). The faith of the blind man con trasted with the unbelief of the Jewish rulers suggested the theme of the public discourse on the Door of the Fold and the Good Shepherd (x. 1-18) ; and the mention of the Shepherd's sacrifice on behalf of the sheep in obedience to the Father led again to a declaration of 64 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE His oneness with God, which provoked another out burst of fury against Him (30-39), necessitating a retirement beyond Jordan. From this retirement Jesus was summoned by the tidings of Lazarus' death (xi. 1-16, a second-hand report). The visit to Bethany and the raising of Lazarus there caused so great enthusiasm among the people (17-46) that in secret counsel it was resolved that He should be put to death (47-53), and this resolve once more drove Him into retirement (54-57). (v) Probably on the Friday evening preceding the Passion Jesus came to Bethany, and at a feast given in His honour was anointed by Mary (xii. 1-8). The popular enthusiasm found vent in the triumphal entry on the Sunday morning (9-19) ; and it was this public movement which probably excited the interest of the Greeks, an interview with whom led Jesus to a definite declaration of the necessity of His death for the universality of His influence (20-24, 32, and iii. 13-15, probably also vi. 62).1 The perplexity of the multitude because of these sayings was met by a final appeal for faith (34-36a, 44-50), which a prophetic quotation showed for the majority of the nation to have been vain (366-43). The witness makes no mention of the controversies during Passion week, nor of the eschatological teaching to the disciples, recorded by the Synoptists. Possibly he was not himself present. He writes as an eye-witness, however, of the Last Supper, although he does not record the institution of the Memorial Feast (xiii. 1-30). In the long discourse which he records there has been con siderable displacement. If chapters xv. and xvi. do not report teaching given in the two or three days 1 The difficulties of this passage have been dealt with in the pre ceding chapter. REMINISCENCES OF THE WITNESS 65 spent in retirement prior to the Supper, they are to be placed either between xiii. 31a and 316, or after 35. The farewell discourse would thus be reported in xiii. 316 or xiv. 1-31, and this would be followed by the prayer (xvii.) while Jesus and His disciples stood around the table, before starting for Gethsemane. The arrest in Gethsemane (xviii. 1-11) was followed first by a preliminary inquiry before Annas (12-14, 24) and then by a formal trial before Caiaphas (19-23), during which Peter's denials probably took place (15- 18, 25, 27).1 The Fourth Gospel passes over the public trial before the Sanhedrin reported by the Synoptics, but gives an account of the trial before Pilate (xviii. 28-xix. 16). The account of the Cruci fixion and Burial, though different, is not inconsistent with the Synoptic (xix. 17-42). The record of the Resurrection has points of contact with that in Luke's Gospel (xx. 1-29). The Gospel ends with a frank declaration of its purpose to awaken faith in Christ (30-31). (3) The course of the ministry so presented makes clear the plan of the record, which can be given in three words, testimony, judgment, glory. (i) The testimony is contained in the first four chapters, and is borne by John the Baptist, the first disciples, and the first sign. To the priesthood, the multitude, and the Pharisees, the three classes of Judaean society, the testimony is offered in vain. In Samaria there is a promise of faith, the fulfilment of which is, however, deferred. The sixth chapter, though a later addition, as has been already argued, falls into the same plan, a confirmation of the view that it should precede the fifth. In Galilee there is the testimony 1 See preceding chapter for a discussion of this passage as of xiii. 36-38. E 66 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE of the popular enthusiasm, real or mistaken, but there already the transition to the judgment or crisis begins. The Judaean opposition invades Galilee, and turns the tide of popularity ; and the multitude who forsake are separated from the disciples who cleave to Jesus. (ii) It is in Judaea, however, that the crisis of recep tion or rejection is mainly placed (chaps, v., vii.-xi.). It is connected with the three miracles of the cure at the Pool of Bethesda, the giving sight to the man born blind, and the raising of Lazarus from the dead, and with the three feasts of Pentecost (or Passover), Tabernacles, and Dedication. Unless we connect the second miracle with the second feast instead of with the third, and the third miracle with the third feast as Dr. Bacon does x instead of putting it after that feast, for which there are no adequate grounds, we are not entitled to charge the witness with such indifference to historical fact as would be the case if he had arbi trarily attached a miracle to. each feast. (iii) Just as in the first section there is a transition to the second, as has already been indicated, so the story of Lazarus, which closes the judgment section, serves as the transition to the account of the Passion and Resurrection, in which the Glory is revealed. But the idea of testimony as well as of judgment is taken up into this last section. It is surely testimony which is borne in chapter xii. by the anointing in Bethany, by the triumphal entry, by the request of the Greeks, by the perplexity of the multitude, and by the prophetic oracle. While the glory of Jesus is being revealed in the circle of His disciples (xiii.-xvii.) and before the Jewish people (xviii.-xix.), there is also judgment, resulting in faith in the one, and unbelief in 1 The Fourth Gospel, p. 409. REMINISCENCES OF THE WITNESS 67 the other. The work is crowned by the glory of the Resurrection (xx.). (iv) This careful arrangement shows that the interest of the witness is not primarily historical but doctrinal and practical ; yet it would be rash to conclude on that account that he does not merely select, but that he also invents. He has not a historical interest in the mere record of facts apart from their significance and value ; but he is interested in history because the doctrine he desires to commend is not a speculative opinion, but the interpretation of a historical person ality, and the practice he desires to evoke is the exer cise of faith, not in an idea or an ideal, but in a personal object. The purpose demanded fact, and not fiction, although it allowed a freer handling of fact than the modern historian admits as legitimate. (4) One of the most formidable objections to the historicity of the Gospel must here be dealt with. It records a number of visits to Jerusalem at the time of the feasts, whereas the Synoptics record only the last visit, and confine the ministry to Galilee and the surrounding regions. Does this difference justify our dismissing the Fourth Gospel as unhistorical ? Some reasons in arrest of such hasty judgment may be given. (a) The completeness of the Synoptic record is an assumption which the results of modern scholarship are more and more disproving. According to the Two-Document hypothesis, the main sources of the Synoptics are two : Mark's reports of Peter's reminis cences and the collection of sayings of Jesus. In his book on Gospel Origins, Prof. Holdsworth gives this hypothesis a form which at least challenges close scrutiny and respectful consideration. He maintains that Mark himseK prepared three editions of his own 68 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE work, so accounting for some of the differences of Matthew and Luke from Mark, and from one another ; and that it was Matthew who first arranged a mere collection of detached sayings of Jesus in a series of discourses, which he fitted in a Markan framework. ' We have only to suppose,' he says, ' what bears every mark of probability, that St. Mark wrote down what he remembered of St. Peter's preaching both while he superintended the Church in Alexandria and later on when he was again associated with St. Peter in Rome, to see that the apparent contradiction between the Fathers may be resolved. Chrysostom and Jerome are right in ascribing the Gospel to Egypt, and Clement is equally right in declaring Rome to be its birthplace. We shall show presently that the Markan narrative in the first Gospel bears unmistakable marks of an Alexandrian origin, while canonical Mark as distinctly points to Rome. But if these marks appear in these two Gospels, the Lukan Mark has many traits which indicate a Palestinian origin, and there is no reason why St. Mark should not have written an even earlier edition of his Gospel which was left at Caesarea, where it would pass into the hands of St. Luke when he visited that town.' x This hypothesis is stated to throw into bolder relief the fact that the other Synoptists are so dependent on Mark, that they cannot be regarded as giving an exhaustive account of the ministry of Jesus. While Luke had access to another source dealing with a ministry in Peraea on the way to Jerusalem for the last visit, and may have gleaned a few additional facts on his visit with Paul to Jerusalem (Acts xxi. 15), yet for the record of events Peter is the only eye-witness. His interest as a Galilaean was in the ministry in Galilee. His silence about his first meeting with Jesus, as recorded 1 Op. cit. p. 117. REMINISCENCES OF THE WITNESS 69 in John i. 41-42, is certainly difficult to explain. One would have thought that the story would often be upon his lips ; but is not a possible explanation this, that after a short period of intercourse Peter and Andrew returned to their homes and their calling, until Jesus transferred His ministry, for reasons to be im mediately noted, from Judaea to Galilee ; and that he regarded his discipleship as beginning with the call to constant companionship in the Galilaean ministry, and so made no mention of the previous less intimate and constant relation ? It is extraordinary that there is no mention of Peter's presence with Jesus in Jerusalem at any of the feasts except the last, although, in the sixth chapter, when the scene of the ministry is shKted to Galilee, he is mentioned. We have no evidence that all the twelve (or any) went with Jesus on all these visits to Jesusalem. The organisation was probably less formal and fixed than later ecclesiastical associa tions lead us to regard it as being. And it may have existed primarily for the work in Galilee, as all the twelve, except Judas, were Galilaeans.1 Peter, there fore, may have said nothing about the visits to Jerusa lem, as he had nothing to report as an eye-witness. For it is certain that in his discourses nothing was further from his mind than to furnish a complete biography of Jesus. The writer may throw out a suggestion which has occurred to him, but which would require further testing before it could be urged with any confi dence. May not Mark have first heard Peter give an account of the Galilaean ministry for the instruction of the primitive community in Jerusalem, for whom any report of visits in Jerusalem would be unnecessary, even if he had been able to speak with special know ledge ? This local circumstance may have given its 1 See Chap. x. for a full discussion of this subject. 70 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE form to the Petrine tradition of the fife and work of Jesus. The account of the last visit would be added when Peter went on his missionary travels ; and Mark as a Jerusalemite would not be dependent here on Peter. The present form of the Gospel according to Mark would be determined by the needs of the readers to whom it was addressed. Is it not highly probable that Peter's teaching in Jerusalem would mainly con sist of the account of the Galilaean ministry ? We must always remind ourselves of how great is our ignorance of the life and work of Jesus ; and there is room for conjecture which accords and does not conflict with the evidence we have. (6) If the Synoptic records are incomplete, we may welcome an additional source of information, if its authenticity can be maintained on historical grounds. (i) Is it not only probable, but even certain, that Jesus as the Messiah of the Jewish nation could not be content to offer Himself for its acceptance or rejection in the comparatively insignificant provfrace of Galilee, but must have felt constrained to press His claims upon it at the very centre of its national religious fife at the seasons when Jews from all park's of the world had come together to worship? .More than London is to the British Empire was Jerusalem to the Jewish nation ; it had a sanctity such as Rome has for the Roman Catholic, if not even greater. Could the full responsibility of refusing His claims be cast on the nation, if the full opportunity of con sidering these claims had not been given ? (ii) But the Synoptic record of the last visit to Jerusalem presupposes a previous ministry there. The mere reports of His sayings and doings in Galilee would not have affected the priests and scribes and the populace in Jerusalem, as the story shows. Surely REMINISCENCES OP THE WITNESS 71 the lament over Jerusalem (Matt, xxiii. 37-39) would become unreal rhetoric if Jesus had not made a more persistent and passionate endeavour to overcome unbefief and hate than the Synoptists record. How could He have said ' How often ' K He only at the end of His ministry made such an attempt ? (iii) Other evidence may be mentioned. Luke records the visit of Jesus to the home of Martha and Mary (x. 38-42), and there is no ground for suspecting John's statement that it was Bethany. Had this been a first visit to former strangers, would such a conversa tion be credible ? Jesus had adherents near or in Jerusalem before the last visit. The same fact is proved by the arrangements Jesus made for the use both of the ass for the entry and of the upper room for the supper (Matt. xxi. 2, 3 ; Mark xiv. 13-14). In neither case need we suppose supernatural know ledge, but a preconcerted sign with a devoted disciple, ready to put his possessions at the Master's disposal. It is even not improbable that the witness himseK was that disciple. There was a Judaean as well as a Galilaean circle of disciples, and these, and not the Twelve, may be referred to in some passages in the Fourth Gospel. (c) This consideration exposes the weakness of one of the links in the chain of argument by which Bishop Westcott tried to prove that the beloved disciple, the author of the Fourth Gospel, can have been no other than John the son of Zebedee. (i) If one so apprecia tive of and devoted to Jesus as Mary of Bethany was not one of the women following and ministering to Him, but remained in her home in Bethany ; if a disciple in Jerusalem not only was ready to offer a room for the Master's use, but seems even to have been unknown to the disciples who were sent on the errand, 72 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE is it impossible that ' the beloved disciple,' who could receive and retain the deeper teaching of the Master, after a short period of following Jesus, even in Galilee, returned to his home in Jerusalem, and was afterwards with Him only when He renewed His ' forlorn hope ' to win the city from its doom to HimseK ? (ii) We have evidence in the Synoptics that Jesus after the confession at Caesarea Philippi failed to find in His constant companions the responsive sympathy with His teaching about His death that He sought. Their quarrels about precedence in the Kingdom show how far their minds were from His. It was John the son of Zebedee who joined in the request for the nearest places to the throne in the Kingdom of God (Matt. xx. 20-28). It was he too who forbade the disciple who was casting out demons in the name of Jesus, although he was not following Him, and wanted to call down fire on the inhospitable Samaritan village (Luke ix. 49-54). It will not do to say that it was the grace of God which afterwards changed one of the sons of thunder (Boanerges, Mark iii. 17) into the apostle of love in the later years, for the capacity to receive and retain this deeper teaching must seem credible in this disciple as he was at the time of the ministry, and not as he might afterwards become, (iii) We may, at least provisionally, conclude that the beloved disciple was with Jesus in Jerusalem, but did not usually follow Him in Galilee. That he was not John the son of Zebedee would offer an adequate explanation of his silence about the ministry in Galilee, the references to which have already been assigned to the redactor. That he was a Jerusalemite would explain his famili arity with the ministry in Judaea and Jerusalem. Thus would two difficulties in regard to the historical trustworthiness of the Fourth Gospel be removed. It REMINISCENCES OF THE WITNESS 73 is historically probable that in Galilee a public move ment was possible which would have been at once suppressed in Jerusalem ; and so probably the Judaean disciples were doing secretly a work for the Master, which showed their devotion, and tested their courage not less, but even more, than the open following of Jesus in His Galilaean ministry. The reason why Jesus went up only at the feasts was probably that the presence of the Galilaean pilgrims in the city and its environs did offer Him a measure of protection which at other times would have been denied Him.1 Judaean disciples would apprehend the danger as the Galilaeans could not, and hence would be readier to give ear to Jesus' warnings regarding the death awaiting Him in Jerusalem, (iv) A confirmatory consideration may be mentioned. While ' disciples ' are mentioned in chapters ii., iii., and iv., no names at all are given, and it is only in chapter vi. when we are again in Galilee that the familiar names, Philip, Andrew, Simon Peter, of chapter i. occur. If that fact does not warrant us in confidently asserting that these ' disciples ' did not include any of the Twelve, it forbids our confidently assuming, as is usually done, that they must have been some of the Twelve. It is possible that these were Judaean disciples, who after wards fell from their faith, or at least shrank back from continued companionship, and that the one who afterwards proved ' faithful among the faithless ' in loving kindness and tender mercy made no mention of their names. Let these suggestions not be dis missed as rash conjectures ; for the call of Peter and Andrew, James and John, as recorded in the Synoptics (Mark i. 16-20), is unintelligible if it was addressed 1 See Mark xiv. 2, ' Not during the feast, lest haply there shall be a tumult of the people.' 74 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE to men who had for months been close companions of Jesus. The truth is that we have formed our conception of the disciple company from the Synoptic records, and when we come to the Fourth Gospel we assume without warrant in the narrative itseK, and contrary to the plain meaning of the Synoptic story of the call, that the disciples there mentioned must be some of the Twelve. (d) Accordingly, to maintain the historical accuracy of both the Johannine and the Synoptic records, it seems to the writer necessary to venture on the follow ing historical reconstruction. The ministry of the Baptist had attracted the Galilaeans mentioned in chapter i. By their contact with Jesus they had been won to a measure of faith in Him sufficient to detach them from the Baptist, and to attach them to Him. Other disciples may have been brought in the same way, but these are mentioned by name because they were afterwards included in the chosen company of the Twelve. The first call was to a less constant com panionship than the call recorded in the Synoptics, when Jesus had definitely decided on a public ministry in Galilee. The unnamed disciple was probably the witness. After the marriage at Cana (ii. 3) it is possible that the Galilaeans went back to their homes, as while ' His disciples ' are said to have gone down with Jesus to Capernaum (v. 12) where we meet the pairs of brothers in the Synoptic record, Jesus only is mentioned as going up to Jerusalem for the Passover (v. 13). During the interval between the first visit to Capernaum (John ii. 12) and the second (Mark i. 21) the witness and other Judaean disciples alone may have been Jesus' companions, and may have left Him only when He decided on Galilee as the scene of His ministry. (5) A brief statement seems relevant at this point REMINISCENCES OF THE WITNESS 75 regarding the way in which the growth of the Gospel may be conceived, (a) The evangelist was the scholar, and the witness the teacher. Either in a small band of disciples, or in the public assembly of the Christian community, he dealt with the life and teaching of Jesus. He began with an account of events or report of dis courses, just as the modern preacher starts with his text ; and then he went on to comment on what he had reported. We cannot throughout the Gospel analyse this preaching or teaching into its components as will be done in regard to iii. 1-21, but we may assume a similar process of composition even where the analysis cannot be made so distinctly and confidently. It is probable that neither the hearer nor even the speaker was aware of the passage from reminiscence to reflexion. The scholar reporting his teacher would feel no need for indicating the points of transition; and his conscience would not trouble him for thus blending (or, as the modern critic, conscious of his own integrity, would possibly say, confusing) history and doctrine. So much in extenuation of the reporter's offence, K offence it be ; what of the witness himseK \ (6) We may conceive the process in his mind as follows. He had not merely a retentive memory, but also an active intelligence ; he meditated on what he remembered, and so gradually, inevitably, and in sensibly reflexions attached themselves to, or even modified, reminiscences. A non-thinking person is more likely to retain the ipsissima verba of a remem bered conversation than a thoughtful one ; the more active the intelligence, the stronger the influence of meditation on recollection. It is quite credible that when preaching or teaching the witness could not always have distinguished the original germ of reminis cence from the subsequent development of reflexion. 76 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE (c) Would he have made the attempt, or felt any obligation to make it ? He was not a modern scholar, aiming at historical accuracy, but an ancient teacher, conscious of the guidance into all the truth of the Spirit of God, promised by the Master. His reflexions would be to him as much part of the given revelation as his reminiscences. He would confidently claim with Paul that he had the mind of Christ. And great as for us is the significance of the earthly fife of Jesus, can we confine the divine revelation through Him to His spoken words alone ? We must include the experi ence of His truth and grace through the Spirit, which has been given to seers and saints. The value of the revelation of Christ in the witness is fully tested by the influence the Fourth Gospel has exercised on Christians of all lands and ages. If we may make a comparison, we may confidently affirm that it has probably been more of a spiritual treasure than any of the others. We can recover, if not with absolute certainty, yet with adequate probability, the history, and we can retain the theology as a valid interpretation of the history of the Word who became flesh. (d) The mode of composition would account for some of the displacements in the Gospel — a subject which has already been dealt with in so far as these displacements are related to the insertion in the Gospel of Synoptic material x and may be due to the unskiKul hand of an editor. For this feature two other explana tions may be suggested, not necessarily alternative, but more probably even complementary, (i) There may have been ' accidental disarrangements of whole leaves in some parent MS. of the present text.' This hypothesis Mr. Thompson works out in detail by show ing that the transposed parts correspond to one or 1 See Chap. iv. REMINISCENCES OF THE WITNESS 77 more pages of the MS.1 (ii) There may have been imperfect recollections on the part of the witness, or of the evangelist. A correspondent has suggested this explanation to the writer. His words may be quoted. ' If one tries to recall an address delivered long ago, and endeavours to write down what one recalls, prob ably one would remember sections. One would recall, say, a passage of a few lines' length, then similar passages. If one then tried to rebuild the whole dis course the unity of utterance would be obscured, and the whole present a result very much like what we have in the Fourth, and indeed in the other Gospels. This might account not only for the disconnected nature of the discourse, but also for the repetition that in some measure occurs.' A teacher of the writer in his old age used to reproduce in public utterance isolated passages, remembered with extraordinary accuracy, from sermons and lectures, but without any logical continuity of thought or historical continuity of fact. 1 The Expositor, 8th series, vol. ix. pp. 421 ff. VI THE TESTIMONY (JOHN I.-IV.) (1) The First Testimony op the Baptist (i. 19-34) (a) In vv. 19-28 the writer at least does not find any thing that need be regarded as in substance unhistorical. If the witness was a disciple of John the Baptist it is probable that he was more fully informed regarding the testimony borne to Jesus than was Peter, the probable source through Mark of the Synoptic account. This testimony contains nothing theologically distinctive, and is in substantial agreement with the Synoptic representation, except in the affirmation of the presence of the one greater than himseK in v. 26. If there was current in Ephesus a tradition that John was greater than Jesus, as the Prologue also indicates, there would be an additional reason for the present record. (6) In vv. 29-34 statements emerge which demand explanation. Verse 30 has already been dealt with as a variant of v. 15 in the Prologue, and as a probable gloss. In v. 29 the description of Jesus, as ' the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world,' is in so marked contrast to the description of the function of the Messiah in the Synoptic account of the Baptist's teaching that it has often been dismissed as unauthentic. In his book, Studies in the Inner Life of Jesus,1 the writer has tried to show that Jesus thought of His 1 Pp. 125-126. 78 THE TESTIMONY 79 vocation as presented in the picture of the suffering servant (Isaiah Iii. 13— liii. 12), and has suggested that Jesus had had some conversation with John, and had raised him for a time at least to the height of His own ideal, and that John in this declaration was echoing the words of Jesus. No more satisfactory explanation has since presented itseK to his mind. Dr. Strachan admits this possibility, although he places the communication at a later date. ' It is by no means so improbable historically as it seems, that the Baptist should have known the mind of Jesus. They were related by birth, and must have had opportunity of conversation on the work of the Mes siah.' x In v. 34 the Baptist claims that he recognized the Messiah 2 by the descent of the Spirit (v. 32). In Mark's account (i. 10) the opened heavens and the descending dove are seen, and the voice of approval is heard by Jesus alone. The account of the heavenly utterance in Matthew (iii. 17) suggests rather that the voice was heard by, and was addressed to others, and not to Jesus alone. Luke appears to substitute an event for a vision (iii. 21-22). It is not intrinsically improbable that the vision was granted to the Baptist to instruct him as well as to Jesus to confirm His sense of His calling. The statement need not in itself cast doubt on the trustworthiness of the witness's record of the Baptist's teaching. While the Baptist's recognition of Jesus as the Messiah is not impossible (vv. 31-34), yet if he testified even to his disciples Jesus' Messiahship, the representation in Mark's Gospel of the gradual process which resulted in the confession of Caesarea Phifippi is inexplicable ; and 1 The Fourth Gospel, p. 80. 2 If the Baptist used the phrase ' Son of God ' on his lips it must have meant that. 80 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE it does seem more probable that the witness is ante dating the befief of a later time. This consideration applies also to the disciples' confession (vv. 41, 45, 49). (2) The Call op the First Disciples (i. 35-51) It is not improbable that the repetition of the declaration (vv. 29, 36) was the occasion of two of the Baptist's disciples following Jesus. (a) In this narrative two questions present them selves for answer. First it is usually assumed that John the son of Zebedee was one of the two disciples ; and that as Andrew found first (Trp'orov, v. 41) his own brother Simon, so John next found his brother James, and thus the two pairs of brothers were the earliest disciples of Jesus. It is true that John the son of Zebedee is closely associated with Peter in the records of the ministry ; but it does not necessarily follow that he was one of the two who first came to Jesus, and it is also mere conjecture that James as well was brought to discipleship at this time. If the unnamed disciple was the son of Zebedee, the fact would be one reason for assigning to him the authorship of the Gospel. If this identification is challenged, however, the question remains : Was the witness the unnamed disciple ? The grounds on which the question may be answered affirmatively are first, the tokens of an eye-witness which the narrative offers in its minute and vivid details ; and second, the probability that the witness for the most part, K not altogether, confined his record to first-hand reports of what he himseK had passed through. (6) While the narrative bears the signs of an eye witness, it must be admitted that reminiscences are coloured by reflexions in two respects. First, the THE TESTIMONY 81 witness assigns to these disciples a much more definite confession of Jesus' Messiahship (vv. 41-45, 49) than in view of the Synoptic representation is at all probable. If Jesus welcomed Peter's confession at Caesarea Phifippi as a revelation, not of flesh and blood, but of the Father (Matt. xvi. 17), is it at all likely that the confession would be made by any of the disciples at the very beginning of their contact with Jesus ? Even if in His intercourse Jesus was less reserved than He found it needful to be afterwards it is not at all likely that so definite a conception was given to the first disciples. In recollecting the past, it is almost im possible to exclude the influence of later experiences, or of our reflexions upon them ; and we must admit that the witness here represents Jesus as already being to His disciples what He became to them only at a much later stage. We must also raise the question whether the words to Peter in v. 42 are not ante-dated, and must be assigned to a time when Jesus had gained a more intimate knowledge of the character of His disciples (Mark iii. 16 ; Luke vi. 14). Secondly, this verse and v. 48 also illustrate the tendency of the witness as well as the evangelist to exaggerate the supernatural character of Jesus' knowledge, unless the evangelist has transformed the report the witness gave. That Jesus had an exceptional foresight based on insight regarding those with whom He came into contact, the Synoptists also testify ; but it is evident that v. 48 is intended to record something altogether miraculous. That Jesus may actually have seen Nathanael with the bodily eye as he was engaged in his devotions, need not be questioned. How did He in that moment gain the knowledge of Nathanael's IKe that the commendation of him impfies ? One cannot exclude the possibility of a supernatural in- 82 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE tuition given to Jesus in the case of Peter as well as Nathanael. But we must also admit the probability that here history has been influenced by theology. Some indications of insight of an exceptional kind must have been given, which excited wonder and stimulated faith ; for that seems implied in v. 51, which may be accepted as a genuine saying of Jesus. Jesus based His insight into man, as all His other gifts, on His relation to God ; and what He promised His disciples was that in His companionship they should witness a constant and intimate communion of God and man. (3) The Marriage at Cana op Galilee (ii. 1-12) In this story three matters call for notice, (a) As we find that in the rest of the Gospel the witness confines himseK almost entirely to Jesus' work in Judaea and Jerusalem, and that the simplest explana tion of the fact is that he was a Judaean disciple who did not, at least usually, accompany Jesus in Galilee, we may raise the question whether he himseK was present at the marriage feast ? If he were not here an eye-witness, we might conjecture that he had got an inaccurate report of the actual occurrence, and that would relieve the difficulty about the nature of the miracle, to which we must return ; it might be conjectured to be a natural provision misunderstood. As the mother of Jesus was entrusted to the care of the beloved disciple (xix. 26, 27), she might be supposed to be his informant, especially as the incident had a pregnant personal interest for her (v. 4). It is more probable, however, that the witness did on this journey accompany Jesus, as he would not be inclined so soon after the first interview to depart from Him. THE TESTIMONY 83 (6) We must accordingly face the difficulty of the nature of the miracle. The writer is a firm befiever in the supernatural endowment in knowledge and power of Jesus, and His miraculous activity, but he must admit that this miracle as well as that of the feeding of the five thousand (of which the story of the feeding of the four thousand is probably only a variant tradition) presents a greater difficulty than the healing works, or even the stilling of the storm and the walking on the sea ; one cannot conceive the process by which loaves and fishes were multiplied, or water was transformed into wine. The explanation of accelerated natural process, poetically expressed in the hymn, ' 'Twas springtide when He blest the bread And harvest when He brake,' does not afford adequate relief to the mind. Probably we must be content to say that the unimaginable to us need not be impossible. As we are here concerned primarily with the Fourth Gospel, it may be added that the difficulty here is of the same kind, not more and perhaps even less than in the miracle of the feeding of the five thousand, which the Synoptics record, so that in this respect the Fourth Gospel does not fall any more under suspicion as regards its trustworthiness than the other Gospels. (c) The miracle is sometimes treated as symbolic of the transformation of human IKe by the influence of Christ. ' He came,' says Dr. Strachan,1 ' to turn the water of the Jewish ceremonial religion into the wine of the Christian Gospel.' Its reality even is denied on the ground that it is a misunderstood allegory. There is, however, no hint in the story that the witness him- 1 Op. cit. p. 87. 84 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE seK so regarded it. If he had, would he not, as he has not hesitated to do in other cases, have added reflexions to reminiscences to fulfil this intention % Surely we need not go beyond v. 1 1 for his interest in the event, the confirmation of his own faith. Was the glory mamfested only in the supernatural power exercised, or in the independence of human direction, the depend ence on divine prompting, and the compassion for human need ? The witness represents Jesus as dis trustful of the belief which rested on beholding His miracles (ii. 23-24) and as rebuking the desire for miracles to evoke faith (iv. 48) ; and the contradiction can be removed only if we suppose that he saw a revelation evoking the true and proper faith in the manner of the deed apart from the power exercised. The sign would then be of divine character and not merely divine power. We need not turn aside from our main purpose to defend the character of Jesus against the charge suggested by the jest of the ruler of the feast (v. 10). (4) The Second Testimony op the Baptist (iii. 22-30) (a) The Rev. J. M. Thompson, in an article on the Accidental Disarrangement in the Fourth Gospel,1 maintains that this passage should be placed between ii. 12 and ii. 13. ' The sequence of thought in iii. 1-15 (the interview with Nicodemus), 16-21 (the first com mentary on it), and 31-36 (a second commentary) is broken by 22-30, a narrative passage describing the relations between Jesus and the Baptist. At the same time a paragraph seems to have slipped out of the text between ii. 12 and 13, where the sudden transition from Capernaum to Jerusalem without the usual mention 1 The Expositor, 8th series, vol. ix. pp. 421-437. THE TESTIMONY 85 of Judaea is as awkward as the subsequent journey from Jerusalem to Judaea in iii. 22. If, however, we suppose that iii. 22-30 originally stood between ii. 12 and 13 both passages are remedied. The continuity of iii. 1-21 and 31-36 is restored, the journey (from Capernaum) to Judaea precedes the arrival in Jerusalem, and other improvements which need not be specified are effected.' x This view commends itself as almost certain to the writer. (b) It is probable that Jesus did at first continue the work of His forerunner, although the actual baptizing may have been done by the disciples. It is also prob able that the success of Jesus in attracting the multi tudes would arouse the jealousy of those disciples of John who had not left him for Jesus. Whether this second testimony is given verbatim, or has been a little coloured by the channel of its transmission, the mind of the witness, there is nothing in the words inconsistent with what we know of the Baptist from the other sources. The Baptist asserted the superiority to himseK of Jesus as the Messiah, and consequently his willingness to rejoice in His greater popularity. The trustworthiness of this declaration depends on whether we assume that the Baptist did recognize Jesus as Messiah. For a former disciple of John this renewed testimony would be of special interest, and may have come to the witness from one of his former companions. (5) The First Visit to Jerusalem (ii. 13-25) In the preceding chapter the writer has already dealt with one of the most formidable objections to the historicity of the Gospel, which at once confronts us in this narrative, as it affects not only this passage, 1 Op. cit. p. 422. 86 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE but the whole representation of the course of the ministry of Jesus in the Fourth Gospel. This passage, however, has a difficulty of its own, which may here be dealt with. (a) A similar action is recorded in the Synoptics at the end of the ministry. We need not, with Dr. Strachan, assume that the key to its position at this part of the Gospel is found in the fact that the evan gelist uses it merely to illustrate the third stage in the faith of the disciples, x if the present position can be historically justified, (i) The quotation in v. 17 sug gests that it was in the mood of prophetic inspiration, in ' holy enthusiasm,' under the influence of the Spirit manKested at His Baptism, which in Mark's vivid phrase ' driveth Him into the wilderness ' (i. 12), and sustained Him through His long fast, that He performed this act. It was not an open claim of Messiahship, but such a challenge to the corrupt priesthood as any zealous reformer might have offered. The second cleansing, taken in conjunction with the triumphal entry, was an assertion of His Messianic authority, not less but more significant because of the repetition. The claims He had made with growing frankness and boldness on successive visits He confirmed by this act ; the first cleansing was an appeal for reform ; the second was a condemnation of resistance to that appeal. Notice the greater severity of the rebuke on the second than on the first occasion. ' Make not my Father's house a house of merchandise ' (v. 16) becomes ' Ye have made it a den of robbers' (Mark xi. 17). What makes this difference the more significant is that the tone of the Fourth Gospel towards the Jews is usually more severe than that of the Synoptists. Imprudent the act was not, as it was necessary for Jesus to test 1 Op. cit. pp. 87-88. THE TESTIMONY 87 the feelings of the Jewish rulers towards a reform movement, so that He might adapt the method of His ministry to the actual situation. There was zeal, but it was according to knowledge. (ii) To the writer this explanation seems sufficient ; but an alternative may be considered. If the cleans ing of the Temple took place once only, it may be argued that the position the Fourth Gospel gives to the incident is the more probable. Firstly, we may ask : Would Jesus, knowing the hostility which was felt towards Him, have added fuel to the flame, if the act was not related, as has just been indicated, to a previous similar act investing it with a significance which as solitary it would not have had 1 Secondly, is it at least not possible that the Synoptists brought together in the record of the last visit incidents which belonged to earfier visits as well as those of the last visit, for they do not follow a strictly chronological order ? If, as has been suggested in the previous chapter, Mark's Gospel consists of the report of Peter's account of the Galilaean ministry for the Jerusalem Church, and of the account Mark could give of events in Jerusalem, of which he himseK was an eye-witness, the possibility becomes at least a probability. The writer does not need to resort to this assumption. (6) Attention may be called to what may be regarded as comments of the evangelist, if not of the witness, the reference to prophecy in v. 17, the probable mis understanding of a saying of Jesus in v. 21, and the emphasis on the supernaturalness of Jesus' knowledge in vv. 24-25. A minor difficulty is the mention in v. 23 of ' the signs which Jesus did.' The Gospel has not recorded any miracles in Jerusalem at this point. If they had occurred, had the witness passed them over, as he could not attach any symbolic significance to 88 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE them, nor find any other personal interest in them ? Or is it unlikely that at so early a stage in the ministry Jesus would freely work miracles ? The reference in iii. 2 excludes the second assumption. It is possible that vv. 23-25 are not an immediate sequel to vv. 13-22, and that we must allow a considerable interval of time for a continuous ministry in Jerusalem between the cleansing of the Temple and the widespread movement of untrustworthy belief to which these verses refer. It is not improbable that in the first inspiration which followed His baptism Jesus did use His supernatural power more freely than He did afterwards, when the evident peril of His being treated as merely a wonder worker inspired a restraint, which only urgent need and confident faith could overcome. Had the witness been possessed, by the desire of miracle-mongering he would assuredly not have been content with noting only the failure of the signs to produce the kind of faith which Jesus desired, and to which He could trust His person and His cause. (6) The Interview with Nicodemus (iii. 1-21) In this narrative there are two issues quite sub ordinate to the present purpose, and one of primary importance. (a) Nicodemus has often been regarded as an indi vidual anxious inquirer ; but Jesus does not treat him with the gentleness which in such a case we might expect, and He addresses him as representing a class while Nicodemus himseK passes from condescension to incredulity. It is probable that Nicodemus was sent by a section of the Pharisaic party, who, as religious leaders of the people, felt their influence imperilled by the growing popularity of the new Teacher, and thought THE TESTIMONY 89 it might be for their advantage to come, if practicable, to some sort of understanding and alliance with Him. Jesus sternly rejects the professed patronage, and severely demands an entire change of attitude as the first condition of understanding or taking part in His movement. As He had tested the Sadducees by the cleansing of the Temple, so He tested the Pharisees by the demand for the new birth, or the birth of water and the Spirit ; and both parties failed to stand the test, even as the people failed to offer the belief which He desired. (6) If our exegesis is to be at all historical, we cannot find in Jesus' words about the new birth, or the birth of water and the Spirit, any allusion to the ecclesiastical dogma of regeneration, to the Christian ordinance of baptism, or to the Christian experience of the descent of the Spirit at Pentecost. For Jesus was not speaking to Nicodemus in riddles. His reference was to the baptism of repentance which John administered and the gift of the Spirit which John announced as the Messiah's prerogative, and which Jesus Himself had experienced when baptized by John. Let the Phari sees come to Him in penitence, and in expectation of blessing, and they would both see and enter into the Kingdom. When such an explanation which preserves the historical character of the interview is not only possible, but probable, it seems gratuitous to offer another such as Dr. Strachan offers in his reference to Christian baptism.1 The teaching here is in no way at variance with, although in terms it may be different from the Synoptic ; and in this interview with Nico demus one feels oneself on the solid ground of reminis cence. A few words on the import of the conversation may be added. Even the leaders of religion and morals 1 Op. cit. p. 93. 90 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE of His people needed the inward change of repentance and inward renewal by the Spirit before they could either understand or submit themselves to His new order of grace. God's Spirit in His teaching, example, and influence was as incomprehensible to them as the movement of the wind, and even their religion and morals belonged to the natural earthly order, and not to His supernatural heavenly order. His confidence in Himself as the witness to and agent of the new order was as decisive as His judgment of the unfitness of Sadducees, Pharisees, and Jewish multitude for any share or place in it. He knew HimseK so far above His own people and age. (c) It is generally acknowledged that reminiscence passes soon into reflexion, although there is difference of opinion as regards the exact point of transition. (i) The Revised Version begins a new paragraph at v. 16, and the writer welcomes the opportunity of quoting so conservative a scholar as Bishop Westcott in support of this view. ' This section,' he says, ' is a commentary on the nature of the mission of the Son, which has been indicated in Christ's words (vv. 13, 14), and unfolds its design (vv. 16, 17), its historic completion (vv. 18, 19), the course of its apparent failure (vv. 20, 21). It adds no new thoughts, but brings out the force of the revelation already given in outline (vv. 1-15) by the light of Christian experience. It is therefore likely, from its secondary character, apart from all other considerations, that it contains the reflexions of the evangelist, and is not a continuation of the words of the Lord. This conclusion appears to be firmly established from details of expression.' x The case need not be argued further. (ii) The writer is convinced, however, that the 1 Gospel of St. John, p. 64. THE TESTIMONY 91 narrative of the interview with Nicodemus does not extend to v. 15. Is it at all likely that Jesus would have spoken to Nicodemus about His heavenly descent, or His heavenward ascent by way of the Cross and the Resurrection, when He even with His disciples exercised such reserve of utterance ? There seems no doubt that vv. 13-15 must be excluded from the story of the meeting with Nicodemus. But are they to be at once reckoned to the witness's reflexions ? To use Bishop Westcott's phrase, ' details of expression ' bar this hasty judgment. The Son of man is a term used of HimseK in the Gospels by Jesus only ; the witness speaks of the Son as the Son of God (vv. 17, 18). If Jesus did speak of pre-existence at all,1 it is not im probable that He described His entrance into the world as a descent from heaven, for did He not describe God as ' Our Father which art in heaven ' ? ' Many ancient authorities omit which is in heaven ' (R.V. marg. v. 13) ; and, whatever may be the balance of the textual evidence, K we are to accept the saying at all as an authentic utterance of Jesus, these words must mani festly be rejected as a gloss, as they are entirely in consistent with Jesus' conception of His earthly IKe as relatively a separation from His Father, and His Death and Resurrection as a return to His Father (xiv. 12, 28 ; xv. 5-7, etc.). The descent is contrasted with the ascent in the IKting up. And the whole thought is quite congruous with the other teaching of Jesus. It bears a resemblance to the saying in i. 51. We may conclude that here we have a genuine logion, but belonging to another context, at a later stage of the ministry. Probably, as has already been shown,2 vv. 14-15 should follow xii. 31, 32, and v. 13, xii. 34 and vi. 62 in a series of sayings, now scattered through- 1 See Chap. i. p. 11. 2 See Chap. iv. p. 58. 92 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE out the Gospel, on the Death and Resurrection, spoken about the same time towards the close of the ministry, when the shadow of death was already falling. These verses may have been attracted to this place by associa tion of ideas with the reference in the preceding verse to the earthly and heavenly things. (iii) About these verses (11, 12) the same question may be raised : Can they belong to the story of the meeting with Nicodemus ? The question in v. 10 would form a deserved dismissal of Nicodemus. It is true that the plural is used in v. 7, so that Nicodemus is treated as the representative of a class ; but in vv. 3, 5, 7, in direct address, the singular is used. Ac cordingly vv. 11 and 12 in their whole tone, as well as mode of address, seem more appropriate to a public discourse than to an individual interview. If without any irreverence the illustration may be used, we may recall the story, now challenged, of Queen Victoria's complaint that Gladstone addressed her as K she were a public meeting. A similar incongruity seems to obtrude itseK here. That the words are authentic utterances of Jesus need not be doubted, only by an association of ideas, not hard to discover (v. 6), they have been attracted here from some other context. Probably, as has been shown, they should with iii. 13 follow xii. 34. We may summarize the results of our inquiry thus : the interview with Nicodemus is re ported in vv. 1-10 ; sayings of Jesus from another context have been attracted by an association of ideas in vv. 11-15 ; the witness offers his comments on his report in vv. 16-21.1 (d) The experimental rather than theological char acter of the passage in vv. 16-21 has led the writer to 1 Verses 22-30 have already been dealt with as properly following ii. 1-12, and vv. 31-36 as tho evangelist's comments. THE TESTIMONY 93 the conclusion that it should be included in the re flexions of the witness rather than the comments of the evangefist. The starting-point of this meditation is the logion of Jesus about the necessity of His death, and all else which may be included in the vfoulv-ty-wdrivai, for man's salvation. He is led to three thoughts : the purpose of the Incarnation — salvation, and not condemnation (vv. 16, 17), the contrast between the divine intention and the human result, the salvation of the few and the condemnation of the many (vv. 18, 19), and the explanation of this contrast in the opposing tendencies of human nature towards light or darkness, good or evil (vv. 20-21). As the Synoptics present the Christian good as the Kingdom of God, and Romans as the righteousness of God, so the Fourth Gospel presents it as eternal life. But the witness is at one with all Christian teachers in making faith in Christ the condi tion of the possession of this good. The conception of the Kingdom of God is not unknown to the Fourth Gospel (iii. 3, 5), nor the conception of eternal fife to the Synoptics. The rich young ruler is concerned about the means of inheriting eternal fife (Matt. xix. 16 ; Mark x. 17 ; Luke xviii. 18), and so is the lawyer who asks the question about the greatest command ment (Luke x. 25). But ' eternal life ' is as char acteristic of the Johannine as the ' Kingdom of God ' of the Synoptic teaching. It is a qualitative and not merely a quantitative conception ; it refers to the character, and not only the duration of fife ; it is moral and spiritual and not merely eschatological. It is fife in the truth, holiness, love, and blessedness of God in Christ. The witness conceives this good as a universal possibility. No trace is there here of the doctrine of election of only some thereto, while others are predestined to perdition. But he recognizes 94 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE human freedom, and the actuality this involves of the rejection as well as the acceptance of the gift. Thus the human result does contradict the divine intention of the Incarnation. In the explanation of this result he does not fall back on any natural in evitable dualism in human nature. He does affirm what every candid inquirer into human IKe must admit, that human choice is not absolutely uncondi tioned, but that the previous character will affect the present decision ; for good or evil conduct reacts on the disposition. Continuance in evil does produce aversion to God, and continuance in goodness has as its reward greater attraction to it. The acceptance or rejection of Christ justly and fitly decides the soul's destiny, as it makes mamfest the permanent tendency of the life. This is a valuable thought, as it proves that the crucial importance assigned to faith in Christ is no arbitrary condition, but true and just. We must not assume that the witness would have denied the possibility of a moral and religious change ; if he had, he would have been in conflict with the teaching of Jesus about the new birth (iii. 3-8). The persistent, violent, and irreconcilable opposition to Jesus which he records, leads him naturally to emphasize the one aspect of the truth to the neglect, but not denial, of the other. Faith or unbelief towards Christ results in fife or death, because each reveals the soul's essential attitude to goodness and God ; since He is related as Son to God as Father. (7) The Journey through Samaria (iv. 1-42) (a) The narrative of the journey through Samaria, K it is not a record of fact, is a masterpiece of literary realism. The conversation moves from point to THE TESTIMONY 95 point naturally. The great truth about the spiritual worship of God (vv. 21-23) arises in the mind and falls from the lips of Jesus almost inevitably in the reaction of His spirit against the religious exclusiveness of the woman (and it may be of His own disciples, who may have expressed some hesitation about taking this route to Galilee, to which, though shorter, some very strict Jews took exception). The declaration in v. 22 is not an instance of Jewish exclusiveness, but an appeal to the woman to recognize the inferiority of her own religious standpoint, of which she was too confident, so that she might be prepared to receive the instruction which Jesus, whom she had repelled as a Jew, desired to impart to her. Since the woman, with her countrymen, thought of the Messiah as the ' Converter ' or the ' Guide,' and did not, at the time at least, seem to cherish the political expectations of the Jews, Jesus could reveal HimseK to her as the Messiah without fear of the political complications that such an avowal would have involved in Judaea and Galilee. Josephus x does tell us of a subsequent Messianic insurrection on Mount Gerizim, but that fact does not prove that the conditions were the same at the earlier and the later date. The way in which the narrative passes from one circumstance to another as determining Jesus' spirit and action shows that a ministry in Samaria was as remote from His purpose as a mission to the Gentiles, not, as the words here (confirmed elsewhere) show, because of His own Jewish exclusiveness, but because He was dominated by His consciousness of His vocation as the Jewish Messiah, through the fulfilment of which alone He could reach forth to the wider function of the Saviour of the world. Accordingly He does not embrace the oppor- 1 Ant. xviii. 4, 1. 96 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE tunity which Samaria now offered, but leaves it to His disciples to enter afterwards into the harvest of which His ministry now was the seed-sowing. (See Acts viii.) Jesus had the insight to perceive that, ready as had been the response of the Samaritans, the soil was not so well prepared for the seed of the Word as in Judaea or Galilee among those who were waiting for the consolation of Israel. The historical probability lends support to the trustworthiness of the record before us. While it may be admitted that the language may have been coloured by the subse quent experience of the Christian Church, it is surely applying the critical method with needless rigour to set aside the reference to the immediate occasion altogether, and to recognize only a reference to the witness's own surroundings, as for instance, Dr. Strachan does. ' This is a typical Johannine passage. The immediate historical situation is forgotten, and we feel that Jesus is speaking to the Church as it was in the evangelist's day. As we read v. 38, for example, we recognize that those addressed can only be the earliest preachers of the Gospel, already engaged in their mission.' 1 (6) There are, however, a few points demanding explanation. (i) As Jesus was alone with the woman, the record of the conversation may have come to the witness either from Jesus, or from the woman ; or it may be that he included parts of the story the woman was so eagerly telling in the instruction Jesus HimseK repeated to His disciples as the explanation of His unusual action, and its still more surprising results. In v. 18 there is a statement which raises a difficulty. Moral and spiritual insight, however exceptional, does 1 Op. cit. p. 109. THE TESTIMONY 97 not include the knowledge of a fact such as that the woman had had five husbands. Jesus was doubtless aware as He spoke to her of her moral degradation, and the discomfort that on account of it she may in His presence have been feeling, since her frank confession, ' I have no husband,' shows that her con science had been stirred ; but the ability to know how often she had been divorced does not seem to fall within the scope of His supernatural endowment. Possibly the witness, having afterwards learned the fact from the woman herseK, may have, quite un consciously, reported this later information as part of Jesus' own speech to her. Or, more probably, the woman herseK in her excitement may have failed to distinguish what Jesus said and what her own conscience spoke in His presence. Her words in v. 29 show that she thought Jesus had laid bare all the secrets of her fife. Another possibility has been mentioned in a preceding chapter, that the statement is due to the evangelist under the influence of his tendency to emphasize the supernaturalness of Jesus' knowledge. This is one of the cases where we cannot with certainty distinguish what the witness may have said and what the evangefist may have written. (ii) While vv. 21-23 arise spontaneously from the context, the more abstract statement in v. 24 may be a reflexion of the witness or a comment of the evangelist. Further, the title the Saviour of the World (v. 42) goes beyond anything that the previous record has prepared us for, and may well reflect the faith of a later age, and not of this historical occasion. (c) The content of the conversation may be briefly sketched. The same confidence is shown in this conversation as in that with Nicodemus. Only here the symbol of water was put to another use, not the G 98 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE cleansing from sin which repentance brings, but the satisfaction of the soul's deepest need and keenest desire (vv. 10-15). But that the need might be felt, and the desire awakened, conscience must be roused (vv. 16-18). The attempt to escape this appeal by an inquiry on ritual questions was at once met by a demand for sincerity and inwardness of worship ; and an assurance that the localized worship of Samaritan and Jew alike would be superseded by such worship (vv. 22-23). The challenge to the priesthood (ii. 19), and the demand on the Pharisees (iii. 7) are both in close correspondence with this assurance, and all three utterances indicate the exaltation of spirit in which Jesus entered on His ministry (ii. 17 ; cf. Mark i. 12, 27). The challenge of His authority in the postponement of the question to the decision of the Messiah compelled His avowal of the Messiahship (vv. 25-26). So absorbed was He by the new order He had come to establish that He was indifferent to bodily needs (v. 34), and so confident was He of His success that He saw harvest where others could see only the seed-sowing (vv. 35-38), but gratefully He recognized all in the previous history of Samaria which had prepared for that success, in which His disciples were called to share. But if in His judgment success in Samaria was so assured, why was the visit so brief (v. 43) ? Probably recognition as Messiah in Samaria would have been no help but a hindrance to His acceptance as Messiah in Judaea, owing to the prejudice of Jew against Samaritan ; and the Gospel makes clear that His main purpose was to offer HimseK as Messiah to the Jews, to whom He was divinely promised. (d) Looking backward on this section of the Gospel — the Testimony — as a whole, the conviction of its THE TESTIMONY 99 historical accuracy is confirmed. It is probable that Jesus began His ministry in Judaea, that He attached that ministry to the work of His forerunner, that at first His disciples were not His constant companions, and that the company of Twelve was formed only for the Galilaean ministry, that He began His ministry with the enthusiasm of the Spirit-filled, certain of His message, confident of His mission, that accordingly He challenged the priesthood, the scribes and the Pharisees, and the multitude as a reformer, if not avowedly as Messiah, and that He was compelled to turn from Judaea to Galilee to seek the faith He claimed. VII THE JUDGMENT (john v., vii.-xi.) (1) The Controversy at the Feast op Pentecost (v., and vii. 15-24) (a) In Chapter rv. reasons have been given for placing chapter v. after chapter vi., and for regarding chapter vi. as an insertion by the redactor. It is uncertain whether the account of the visit to Cana (iv. 43-54) is also to be regarded as due to the redactor ; but this is much less probable. The activity of the redactor must be regarded as responsible for the displacement of vii. 15-24, which is the sequel of v. If the Feeding of the Five Thousand took place about the time of the Passover (vi. 4), then it is probable, as has already been suggested, that the unnamed feast of v. 1 was Pentecost. As no disciples are mentioned, and the man cured does not know his benefactor, it is likely that this visit too, like the next at the Feast of Taber nacles, was made ' not publicly, but as it were in secret ' (vii. 10). Another transposition still is suggested by Mr. Thompson : x ' The discourse attached to the healing of the impotent man in v. has really nothing to do with this particular miracle, and would be more appropriate (v. especially the emphasis on ^(oonroielv in v. 21, 25, 28) to the raising of Lazarus, 1 The Expositor, 8th series, vol. ix. p. 423. 101) THE JUDGMENT 101 which, as it stands, has^no accompanying discourse. It is therefore possible that v. 19-47 is a case of dis arrangement.' This displacement is not, however, so probable as is the other. The first reason given — its irrelevance to the occasion — will be deprived of its force K the view is correct that most of this passage is either reflexion, and not reminiscence, of the witness, or more probably even comment of the evangelist, as has already been shown.1 The second reason is also not convincing, unless on the assumption of an altogether artificial arrangement of the Gospel. The circumstances of the raising of Lazarus did not give occasion for a discourse. (6) We may now look more closely at the passage itseK. The explanation of the troubling of the waters in v. 4, which might be used to charge the witness with too ready a credulity, is absent from the best MSS. How Jesus knew that ' he had been now a long time in that case ' we are not told. We might suppose that here again the witness assumed supernatural knowledge, but yvovs is the verb used. The warning in v. 14 indicates that Jesus had know ledge of the man's past, but neither are we told how that was gained. Jesus had disciples in Jerusalem, and the man would be well known. Some previous knowledge, and not only the sight of the moment, may have stirred in Jesus the compassion whioh moved Him to offer spontaneously the cure in awakening the desire for it (v. 6). That the act of cure on the Sabbath provoked hostility is entirely in accord with the Synoptic record (v. 16), although the hostility in Judaea was more violent than in Galilee. Jesus' justification in v. 17 carries us into another circle of ideas than the defences of Sabbath cures offered 1 See Chap. n. p. 21. 102 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE in the Synoptic records ; but in vii. 22-23 the defence is of the same kind as was usual in Galilee. That Jesus claimed His Father's example, the constant beneficent activity of God in nature (Matt. vi. 26-32) as a justification of His own act is, however, not itseK unlikely, especially in view of the probability that in Jerusalem, in face of more violent embittered opposition, He asserted His claims more openly and persistently than He did in Galilee, where these claims, being misunderstood, might lead to an un- desired Messianic movement. It was His purpose to bring the Jewish people at the centre of its faith and worship to a decision for or against His claims, and not His desire to excite a merely local disturbance. Whether the witness accepted the interpretation of the words which Jesus' opponents put on them we cannot tell, as vv. 20-29 (excepting v. 24) have been shown to be due to the evangelist. The theology of this passage is the theology of the Prologue, and not of the witness's reflexions or his reminiscences. The context itseK justifies this assumption, for throughout the discussion which follows it is the Son's dependence on and submission to the Father which is insisted on. If we find the 6/j,oovcnov here our exegesis is dogmatic, and not historical. That the saying aroused so fierce an outburst of hate shows that there must have been previous controversy, and that there had been gathered fuel of hate, ready to kindle at the feeblest spark. Without assuming that vv. 30-47 are a verbatim report, it seems to the writer that we can accept them as a substantially accurate account of the controversy of Jesus with His opponents. The same assumption seems justified as regards the sequel of the controversy in vii. 15-24, as the connexion of thought is obvious. The reference of Jesus to the THE JUDGMENT 103 writings of Moses leads to the question about His knowing letters. (c) The course of the controversy can be sketched in a few sentences. Whatever objection the opponents had made to Jesus' direct appeal to God as warranting His action, He justified that appeal by His claim of His perfect knowledge of His Father's will due to His entire dependence on and obedience to God (v. 30 ; cf . Matt. xi. 25-30). Discarding self-witness He appeals to the witness of John, held in so high favour by the people (vv. 32-35) and to the greater witness of His works as proving His divine mission (v. 36). Reproaching His hearers with their unbefief, He sends them to the witness of the Scriptures, although He expects this appeal also to be vain (vv. 37-40, which v. 24 as an explanation and confirmation of v. 40 might follow). Next, the reason for and the results of the rejection of His manKold witness are stated. Themselves selfish, because lacking the love of God, His unselfishness as revealing God provokes their refusal, a refusal on which falls the condemnation of the law which bare Him witness (vv. 41-47). Jesus' appeal to the Scriptures calls forth the taunt : ' How can this uneducated fellow manage to read ? ' x The taunt is met by the declara tion that the source of His teaching is not in Himself, but in God, as any one willing to obey God may dis cover for himseK ; and that the selflessness of His aim guarantees His own sincerity (vii. 15-18). The taunt is also flung back upon them. Their enmity to Him because of His supposed breach of the law is proof of their ignorance of the law (vv. 19-21). Then follows the kind of argument in defence of Sabbath cures, such as we have in the Synoptics ; K the rite of circumcision may be performed on the Sabbath, 1 Moffatt 's New Testament, p. 120. 104 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE why not an entire cure ? The controversy ends with a pregnant saying as to false and true judgment (vv. 22-24). (d) As we follow the course of this controversy and subsequent discussions, the impression is fixed upon us that we have here sayings direct from the lips of Jesus, such as v. 24, which should probably follow v. 40, v. 35, v. 39, vii. 17, and v. 24 ; but that for the most part reminiscence has been affected by reflexion in the sharpness of the controversial tone, the vehemence both of the seK-assertion and of the condemnation of others. While pregnant sayings might be remembered verbatim, a discussion like this is not likely to have been, although its general import may, with these pregnant sayings as points of attachment ; and its temper may have been insensibly altered. We are tempted to ask here and elsewhere, Could these words fall from the lips of the meek and lowly in heart ? The possibility must be admitted that the witness in his passionate devotion to his Master, and his no less vehement indignation against his Master's enemies, may have unconsciously exaggerated the polemic character of both the spirit and the content of Jesus' teaching. Dr. Strachan may be right in saying : ' We cannot conceive Jesus thus exasperating His opponents. The tones of contem porary controversy are heard here, and right through this passage.'1 On the contrary side, however, it must also be remembered that Jesus combined severity with gentleness, and even of His earthly ministry we - might use the paradoxical phrase ' the wrath of the Lamb.' We must not forget His woes on Chorazin, Bethsaida, and Capernaum (Matt. xi. 20-24), and His terrible denunciation of the scribes and Pharisees at the close of His ministry (xxiii. 1-36) : also His solemn 1 The Fourth Gospel, p. 136. THE JUDGMENT 105 warning about the unpardonable sin against the Holy Ghost (xii. 31-32). The hostility in Jerusalem was more persistent, vehement, and ruthless than any experienced in Galilee. As it came from the rulers, the teachers, and the leaders of the nation, it was more fatal to the acceptance of Jesus as Messiah by the Jewish people. These enemies were responsible for the rejection of Jesus, and the doom that would fall on the nation. The lament over Jerusalem (Matt. xxiii. 37-39) follows the denunciation of the scribes and Pharisees ; it was Jesus' compassion for the people which intensified His indignation against the blind leaders of the blind. We abstain from judging, because we know that we ourselves deserve to be judged. Surely the sinless and perfect had a right to condemn as no other man has. His insight enabled Him to know the unreality both of the piety and the patriotism under which pride, greed, conceit, censoriousness, seK-indul- gence and seK-interest hid themselves. The Synoptic records leave unexplained the hatred which pursued Jesus to death ; but the record of the controversies in Jerusalem offers an intelligible explanation. Are we not, in finding a difficulty in the severity of Jesus, con demning our own moral and religious standpoint ? Was not His burning indignation against falsehood, wrong, and hate the reverse of the moral perfection of which passionate devotion to God, truth, and good ness was the obverse ? Because He as Son was so certain of God as Father could He be so confident in His judgment of those who not only rejected that Fatherhood in Him, but stood in the way of others accepting its blessings. 106 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE (2) The Controversy at the Feast op Taber nacles (vii. 1-14, 25-52, viii. 12-59) (a) It has already been maintained that vii. 1 is the sequel to vii. 24, and that vii. 15-24 continues the story of v. 1-47. It was the attempt made on His life at the Feast of Pentecost (vii. 19) which led Jesus, not only to withdraw to Galilee (vii. 1), but also to abandon what seems to have been His usual practice of going up to the feast with the Galilaean pilgrims (v. 10) ; and the precaution was wisely taken, as His opponents were on the outlook for Him (v. 11). The attitude of His brethren here described (vv. 3-8) is also attested by Mark iii. 21, 31-35 ; and His refusal to be guided by their advice is exactly paralleled by His reply to His mother at the marriage in Cana (ii. 4), in which also His sole and entire dependence on God is asserted. An intimation of the Divine will that He should go to the festival, accompanied doubtless by an assurance of the Divine protection if He went, is probably the explana tion of the change of plan (cf. xi. 6-10). We cannot be sure what change of conditions made it safer for Him to appear publicly at the middle of the Feast than at the beginning. But possibly the presence of large numbers of friendly pilgrims may have offered some security ; and His non-appearance at the com mencement may have for a time thrown His enemies off their guard, so that He gained His brief opportunity of appealing to the people before steps were taken to seize Him (vv. 43-46). (6) We seem in this record to be in the region of historical probability, and only a few matters claim closer scrutiny. We may note how carefully the wit ness distinguishes the different currents of opinion. In vii. 12 the phrase, ' among the multitudes ' (R.V. iv -rot? THE JUDGMENT 107 0^X019) is used to describe ' the different groups of strangers who had come up to the festival, and such as consorted with them ' ; 2 and a conflict of opinion is here recorded. The Jews (vv. 11 and 13) are the openly and bitterly hostile party, described in v. 26 as the rulers, and composed, according to v. 32, of the chief priests and the Pharisees. ' The combination occurs also in St. Matthew (xxi. 45, xxvii. 62). The phrase probably describes the Sanhedrin under the form of its constituent classes.' 2 The Pharisees were the demo cratic party in close contact with the people, and so kept well informed of the popular opinions (vii. 32, viii. 13), and through them the aristocratic party of the priesthood was moved to action. In vii. 25 another group is mentioned, distinguished on the one hand from the multitudes, the pilgrims, and on the other from the members of the Sanhedrin, and described in the phrase rivev ' IepocroXv/MetToiv, citizens of Jerusalem, ' who were acquainted with the designs of the hierarchy, and yet not committed to them.' 3 Probably the witness himseK was in close contact with this group, and may even have been seeking to influ ence it to a favourable judgment. The opinions ascribed here would not be spoken openly ; and how could one of the Galilaean disciples become aware of what was being thus privately discussed ? While the term Jews is usually applied to the hostile party of priests and Pharisees, in viii. 31 it is used of another group, whose hostility, if it had existed, had been so far overcome that they had believed Him (tow irernG- T6v«oVa? avrm 'IovSalovs). But their belief is dis tinguished from the faith of the numbers who ' believed in Him ' (v. 30, iroWail e-rriaTevcrav ei? avrov), 1 Westcott's St. John, p. 117. 'Idem, p. 121. 3 Idem, p. 120. 108 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE if we may assume that ' the change in the construc tion of the verb ' has some significance. According to Westcott this group ' acknowledged His claims to Messiahship as true, were convinced by what He said, but still interpreted His promises and words by their own prepossessions.' 1 In the warning Jesus recognizes the imperfection of their faith ; and their quick resentment of His speech shows the superficiality of the impression made on them (v. 33). To the writer it seems incredible that one who was not an eye-witness, and had no concern for his torical reality, should so carefully have distinguished the varied and the varying attitudes assumed towards Jesus, and have presented them with so striking verisimilitude. (c) A second indication of trustworthiness is surely to be found in the figures in which Jesus made His appeal to the multitude.2 In vii. 37 He offers HimseK as the living water ; and in viii. 12 as the light of the world. The appropriateness of the first may be indicated in the words of Dods : ' On each of the seven feast days water was drawn in a golden pitcher from the pool of Siloam, and carried in procession to the Temple, in commemoration of the water from the rock with which their fathers in the desert had been provided. On the eighth day, which commemorated their entrance into a " land of springs of water " this ceremony was discontinued. But the deeper spirits must have viewed with some misgiving all this ritual, feeling still in themselves a thirst which none of these symbolic forms quenched, and wondering when the vision of Ezekiel would be realized, and a 1 Westcott's St. John, p. 133. 2 In this connection may be recalled what has been said about the teaching regarding the manna, which the redactor has placed in chapter vi. THE JUDGMENT 109 river broad and deep would issue from the Lord's house.' x As regards the fitness of the second figure, the same writer's words may also be quoted : ' Not withstanding Meyer and Holtzmann, it seems not unlikely that this utterance was prompted by the symbolism of the feast. According to the Talmud, on every night of the feast the Court of the Women was brilliantly illuminated. This brilliant fighting was perhaps a memorial of the Pillar of Fire which led the Israelites while dwelling in tents.' 2 The witness was assuredly one who was thoroughly familiar with Jewish customs, and also with the mode of the teaching of Jesus, whose language was always ap propriate to the occasion and to the environment, as the Synoptic reports show. The comment in vii. 39, however, is probably a misunderstanding of the meaning of Jesus due to the witness, or the evangelist as Mr. Thompson contends.3 (d) The appropriateness of the imagery in viii. 12 seems to be a reason against accepting Mr. Thompson's suggestion that viii. 12-20 is also a displacement. ' The removal from the Gospel of the undoubted interpolation vii. 53-viii. 11 (the pericope adulterae) leaves viii. 12-20 in an awkward position after vii. ; for the end of vii. is a climax, yet in viii. 12 we are back in the middle of an argument. If this paragraph has been displaced, its original position was probably at the beginning of vii. immediately after vii. 15-24.' 4 What is not adequately taken into account in this statement is that we are not following the plot of a cunningly made drama, which moves right on to its completion ; but the ebb and flow of a tide of human 1 Expositor's Greek Testament, i. p. 767. ! Idem, p. 773. 3 The Expositor, 8th series, vol. xiv. pp. 220-222. * Idem, vol. ix. p. 423. 110 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE passion and purpose ; and so we must not expect absolute continuity. There were several crises before the final one was reached. The possibility must, however, be admitted that viii. 12-20 should be placed between vii. 36 and 37 (cf. vii. 34 and viii. 14). (i) Mr. G. N. C. Macgregor favours the suggestion that viii. 12-20 should follow vii. 15-24, and precede vii. 1-14, vii. 25 ff. on the following ground : ' Chapter vii. 24 standing by itseK would form a very abrupt conclusion, the transition thence to vii. 1 being sudden and harsh. Insert viii. 12-20 at this point, and we find that v. 20 forms an admirable conclusion to the in cidents in Jerusalem during Pentecost narrated in chapters v. and vii. 15-24.' 1 The same objection here also applies, the appropriateness of the imagery to the later Feast of Tabernacles. What seems a more attractive suggestion is set aside by Macgregor : ' Burton would place it outside the chapters under discussion after x. 21 (x. 19-21 being transposed to follow immediately after ix. 41). This setting appears good, Jesus' proclamation of HimseK as the Light of the World following most appropriately after the healing of the man born blind, the Pharisees' question, " Are we blind also ? " (ix. 40), and the question of " others," " Can a devil open the eyes of the blind " (x. 21).' 2 We can here only weigh the probabilities and cannot affirm any certainty. (ii) Mr. Macgregor 2 also proposes to place viii. 21-59 after vii. 1-14 plus vii. 25-36, as he does not regard the transition from vii. 52 to viii. 21 as satis factory. Jesus cannot possibly be thought of as present at the private inquiry of the chief priests and Pharisees, including Nicodemus, into the failure of ' the officers ' to arrest Him. Yet at viii. 21, He is 1 The Expository Times, xxxiii. p. 75. 2 Idem, p. 75. THE JUDGMENT 111 suddenly introduced as renewing to this audience a discourse exactly similar to that broken off at vii. 36, and this in spite of the fact that v. 37, marking the transition to a different occasion altogether, has intervened.' x The need for this transposition depends on the transposition just discussed having been accepted, as vv. 20 and 21 form quite a satisfactory sequence, and in the kind of controversy Jesus was engaged in a resumption of a previous thought is not improbable. If the possibility of viii. 12-20 being transposed after vii. 36 be admitted, then viii. 21-59 could, but need not, go with it to this new position. One transposition of viii. 12-59 is more probable than two transpositions of viii. 12-20 after vii. 15-24 and of viii. 21-59 after vii. 36, and on other grounds is to be preferred, if the necessity of the transposition is at all accepted. (iii) Mr. Macgregor holds that ' one more trans position makes the sequence of the two chapters under consideration perfect. Transpose vii. 45-52 before vii. 37-44 (as Burton suggests, so that v. 45 follows immediately on viii. 59). How perfectly natural the train of events. ... At vii. 32 the officers are sent to arrest Jesus, at viii. 59 they allow Jesus to escape, and in the very next verse, vii. 45, they are called to account for their remissness ; moreover, these events can now take place during the course of a single day. We are now left with vii. 37-44 as a climax to the whole section dealing with Jesus' visit to Jerusalem at the Feast of Tabernacles. This, as so often in this Gospel, concludes with a summing up of the impression left by Jesus on the people.' 2 This conjecture hi s much to commend it ; although we must remember that the actual course of events 1 The Expository Times, xxxiii. p. 75. 2 Idem, p. 76. 112 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE need not closely correspond with the unfolding of a historical drama, as it presents itseK to our imagination as most appropriate. To none of these suggestions need serious exception be taken, except the proposal to transpose viii. 12-20 after vii. 15-24, and so transfer it from the record of the Feast of Tabernacles to that of the Feast of Pentecost. We need not follow further this writer in his discussion of the possible explanation of these displacements, i.e. ' Spitta's theory that the pages of a papyrus roll had got out of order.' While he recognizes that ' the whole theory is a precarious one on which to work,' yet he holds that ; when it is applied to chapters vii.-viii. the results are certainly arresting,' and the application of the theory ' serves to corroborate the results previously arrived at from a study of the internal evidence, and, in addition, suggests a possible explanation for the insertion of the much debated Pericope de adultera.' x It is not necessary for the present purpose to discuss the passage vii. 53-viii. 11, as the general conclusion of scholars is accepted. But it may be pointed out that the intrusion of a passage not authentic affords some justification for the assumption that there have been displacements in the text of the Gospel, and that we may without rashness attempt to restore the order of the original document. (e) The result of the controversy at the previous feast was a division of opinion among the people ; but no open confession by even the favourably inclined owing to the terrorism exercised by the influential opponents of Jesus (vii. 12, 13). (i) The freedom for a time allowed Him at the Feast of Tabernacles, to which He came only at the Divine prompting 1 The Expository Times, xxxiii. p. 78. THE JUDGMENT 113 (vv. 6-10) after rejecting the advice of His unbelieving brethren (vv. 3-5), led some of the multitude to believe that even the rulers might be restrained by the belief in the possibifity of His Messiahship (vv. 25-26) ; and yet the surmise was set aside on the ground that, while Jesus' home and family were known (Nazareth, and not Bethlehem being thought of), the appearance of the Messiah, as commonly expected, would be sudden (v. 27). This objection Jesus at once met by reasserting His divine mission (vv. 28-29). A subsequent attempt at arrest evoked the declaration of His speedy return to God, and therewith the close of the opportunity of His hearers (vv. 30-34), some of whom were being moved to believe. This declara tion suggested to some of His hearers the possibifity of His undertaking a mission to the Dispersion (vv. 35-36). (ii) On the last day of the Feast, Jesus made a direct, final appeal to the multitude. He promised the believer in Him not only full spiritual satisfaction, but also abounding spiritual power (vv. 37-38), a promise which had probably a more general reference than to the gifts of Pentecost. Such a declaration only increased the division of opinion among the people, and His arrest was deferred. Even in the Council Nicodemus pleaded for suspense of judgment. If viii; 12-20 and 21-59 are in the proper place, and should not be put between vii. 36 and 37, the controversy was soon after resumed. Having as the Water of LKe offered satisfaction, Jesus next as the Light of the World offered illumination (possibly referring to the Shekinah, viii. 12). But this claim the Pharisees, jealous of their position as the authoritative teachers, at once challenged on the ground of the untrustworthiness of seK- witness (v. 13). Jesus met the challenge by claiming truth for His 114 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE seK-witness, because of His seK-knowledge and know ledge of the Father whose companionship He is en joying as He is discharging His mission (vv. 14-16). With an appeal to the requirements of the law, He adds the Father's witness to His own (vv. 17, 18). Their scornful question as to the identity of His Father He rebuked by charging them with ignorance, both of HimseK as revealing and of the Father as revealed in Him (vv. 19-20). (iii) On another occasion, when Jesus repeated the warning of the speedy close of the day of grace, a more sinister suggestion than that of a mission to the Dispersion (vii. 35) was made, even that He would commit suicide ; and such a taunt called forth a de claration of the contrast in nature between HimseK as from above, and them as from beneath, and a warning of judgment on their sin of unbelief (vv. 21-24). Their plea of ignorance regarding HimseK, and so His claim to belief, probably intended to evoke a distinct assertion of His Messiahship, which might have been charged against Him before the Roman governor, was met by a saying, of which there are different readings and renderings. Nestle reads rr/v dpxvv ° ft Kai \a\m vfiiv ; the A.V. has not got the point of interrogation, but Westcott has, and on as one word. Taking it as a question, Moffatt renders, ' Why should I talk to you at all ? ' x If the words be taken as a statement, Westcott translates, ' Altogether, essentially I am that which I even speak to you,' but prefers the other rendering himseK.2 In either case no direct answer was given. Either further discussion was declined, or the sufficiency of the information already given was asserted (v. 25). Further teaching was needed, and, 1 The New Testament : a New Translation, p. 125. 2 The Gospel of St. John, p. 131. THE JUDGMENT 115 as entrusted by His Father, would be delivered ; but the unbelief of His hearers would make that teaching judgment (v. 26 ; v. 27 is a comment probably of the evangelist). As His hearers made no intelligent response, a clearer warning was given that at His exaltation even those who were now unbelieving would recognize Him as Messiah, and His dependence on God, message and mission from God, and possession of the Presence of God because of His constant obedience (vv. 27-29). (iv) A faith, just beginning in a few, received the assurance of spiritual liberation through the truth on condition of continued discipleship ; but the assur ance, instead of confirming the faith, provoked re sentment that even the need of such liberation should be suggested to descendants of Abraham (vv. 30-33). The nature of the bondage, not as outward but as inward to sin, was declared ; and a relationship to God as sons through Him the Son was offered as a condition of this freedom (vv. 34-36). A sudden change either in the feelings of the crowd, or in the persons composing it, can alone explain the swift change of tone at v. 37. The murderous intentions of those who boasted their descent from Abraham were exposed, and another descent was with ruthless severity assigned to them. As His words revealed His divine, so theirs their diabolic descent, and con tradicted their claim to relationship with Abraham (vv. 37-40). It is not probable that in v. 41, ' We were not born of fornication,' there is any reference to the current slander about Jesus' birth, which was of much later date ; but fornication is used as is adultery in the Old Testament for any departure from God through idolatry ; and in the words spiritual descent from God as certain as the physical descent 116 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE from Abraham is claimed. This claim Jesus, however, will not allow ; their rejection of HimseK, coming from, sent by, and in His teaching revealing God, proves their kinship with the devil, the source of the falsehood opposing the truth, and of the hate planning the murder of its bearer (vv. 42-45). The challenge to His opponents, ' Which of you convicteth me of sin ? ' may mean either that no moral offence showing His kinship with the devil could be proved against Him, or that He could not be shown in error regarding the account He had just given of the nature and origin of the sin of His opponents. The second would imply the first ; only moral perfection could claim moral infallibility. He was not in error ; their rejection of Him was a rejection of truth, and that was evidence that their spiritual descent was not from God (vv. 46- 47). Stung to the quick by this charge, His opponents applied to Him the hateful name Samaritan, and even suggested that the words proved Him possessed (v. 48). Repelling the charge, He reaffirmed the dis interestedness of His motives and His regard only for God ; and from their judgment He confidently carried the appeal to God's unerring tribunal (vv. 49-50). At this point (v. 51) Jesus made a declaration which, while consistent with the teaching elsewhere, broke rather abruptly the continuity of the argument ; yet, as its subsequent course depends on it, the saying cannot be regarded as interjected from another con text. Yet the saying may be explained in this way. Weary of the profitless wrangle, Jesus turned again from His opponents, to whom at v. 37 He had begun to address HimseK in tones of so great severity, to the less hostile persons whom He had been addressing in vv. 31-32. It was like Him to do this, for judgment was His strange work, and in mercy was His delight. THE JUDGMENT 117 He now added to the promise of liberation the promise of deliverance from the power of death as a reward of discipleship. The promise was suitable to the occasion, for what His opponents were bringing on themselves was their own doom. His opponents would not, however, desist, but at once replied that such a claim proved possession beyond doubt or ques tion, since even Abraham and the prophets had died, as it asserted superiority to the greatest men of the nation. What megalomania was this on His part (vv. 52-53) ! Disclaiming all vain ambition, He represented the dignity He claimed as a trust from God, which it would be falsehood in Him to deny (vv. 54-55). Opposition instead of depressing elevated His spirit. He declared His mission to be a good, the prospect of which brought joy to the breast of Abraham, so conscious was He that in Him all God's promises which had comforted His people had at last found their fulfilment. It is a saying which cannot be taken with prosaic literalness as it was taken by His opponents. Against their taunt that His age forbade any such knowledge of Abraham, He declared His pre-existence, a declaration which has already been dealt with in connection with the Pro logue. This provoked an attempt at stoning. (/) In estimating the historical value of the record, the considerations advanced in regard to the previous controversy must be recalled. Here the final issue of His acceptance or rejection as Messiah was in volved ; and He laid aside reserve and restraint, and used the whole of the resources of argument, appeal, and authority. ' It is not improbable too that the more His claim of sonship was contradicted and chal lenged, the more distinct, confident, and dominant would His self-consciousness become. To the writer 118 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE it does not seem improbable that the intuition of pre-existence (viii. 58), the certainty that His rela tion to God as Son to Father was not temporal but eternal, antecedent to the very beginnings of God's revelations to the chosen people, flashed upon Him as a gleam from heaven, when the shadows of unbelief and hate were gathering thick and close around Him. The teaching of those chapters does not seem to go beyond what was possible, and even necessary, for the occasion. (3) The Controversy at the Feast of Dedication (ix. and x.) (a) The incident recorded in the ninth chapter leaves a vivid impression of historical reality ; the development of the faith of the man born blind, to whom sight was given, is shown in a most con vincing way. As the incident closely connects itself with the teaching given in x. and the note of time there (v. 22) fixes the date of that teaching, we may regard both chapters as an account of a visit to Jeru salem at the Feast of Dedication. The disciples men tioned in ix. 1 need not be the Twelve, but may be Judaean disciples, including probably the witness, whose account here seems to be given at first hand. Would the Galilaean disciples be interested in the question of v. 2 ? Is there convincing proof for Dr. Strachan's statement that the suggestion that the man himseK had sinned is ' a Hellenistic and not a strictly Jewish idea ' ? Must we find in the process of healing ' two points of rather subtle symbolism ' ? In regard to the statement in v. 34, ' they cast him out (eijefiaXov avrov e£a> ; cf. v. 22, airoavvayaiyos yivrjTai), may we not find the reference to the imme- THE JUDGMENT 119 diate historical occasion, or must we ignore it alto gether, as does Dr. Strachan ? ' We must realize again,' he writes, * that the synagogue of which the Evangelist is really thinking would be in Asia Minor, and not in Palestine. The chapter is founded on an actual incident, but we know that excommunication in the time of Jesus could not be pronounced by the authorities of a synagogue. The Sanhedrin alone could do this. Among the Jews of the Dispersion, on the other hand, the synagogue became more and more a central authority ; for the Jewish colonists were separated by long distance from the ecclesiastical authorities at Jerusalem. There may have been some minor form of excommunication that could be exercised by a local synagogue in our Lord's day, but there can be no doubt that the strong words used in v. 34 imply the severest sentence possible.' * Even K in respect of this word we may admit a slip of memory on the part of the witness, we need not sacrifice the trustworthiness of the narrative as a whole. (6) Dr. Moffatt in his New Translation makes a transposition which seems justified. He connects x. 19-29 directly with ix. 41. An appropriate com ment on Jesus' action and speech in chapter ix. is offered in x. 19-21 ; and vv. 22-29 follow quite naturally on vv. 19-21, vv. 26 and 29 continue the thought of vv. 24, 25, and very appropriately lead up to the teaching in x. 1-18. Also it seems more probable that such a declaration as ' I and my Father are one ' (v. 30) would follow on the frank declaration of His intention to lay down and take up His life again (vv. 17, 18), than on the assurance of God's power over all (v. 29). Altogether there is a decided gain 1 The Fourth Gospel, pp. 140-141, 142, 120 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE in the continuity of the teaching by this rearrange ment. Mr. Thompson also connects x. 19-21 as the appropriate climax with ix. 41 ; and maintains that x. 1-18 has been displaced on the ground that a new episode obviously begins with x. 22. He places this passage, however, not, as Moffatt does, after x. 29, but between vv. 28 and 29 ; and even suggests another position. ' Perhaps it is more seriously astray, and belongs to the gap between xvi. 24-25, where a irapoifila (x. 6, xvi. 25) with an eschatological reference (the true Shepherd contrasted with the false prophets, x. 8 — there are also points of contact with xvii.) would be in place.' x This suggestion is less probable than the other, which assigns to the passage an altogether appropriate context. (c) Points of theological interest in the narrative of the miracle are the following : Jesus' denial of the necessary connexion between suffering and sin, and His declaration that man's necessity is God's opportunity (ix. 3) ; His claim for faith as the Son of Man (reading dvdpmirov instead of deov as do Nestle and Westcott) ; and His assertion of a present judg ment of men in their attitude to HimseK (vv. 36-41). His charge of wiKul blindness so irritated His enemies that madness was ascribed to Him ; but the wonder of the miracle so impressed some that the suggestion was rejected (x. 19-21). Pressed vehemently to assert His Messiahship, Jesus replied that both in word and deed He had offered sufficient ground for faith, and that unbefief could be due only to alienation of spirit from Him : ' Ye are not of my sheep ' (vv. 22-26). Thinking doubtless of the blind man's growth from darkness to fight, Jesus at this point turned from His enemies to describe His disciples 1 The Expositor, 8th series, ix. pp. 423-424. THE JUDGMENT 121 as His sheep, obedient to Him, and kept securely by Him because given to Him, and held for Him by the Father's almighty power (vv. 27-29). (d) The passage in chapter x. 1-16 is interesting as an example of the allegory into which, according to the Fourth Gospel, Jesus expanded His metaphors. (i) In this Gospel there are no parables exactly similar in structure to those in the Synoptics, and we may raise the question, whether and why Jesus avoided in Judaea a mode of teaching so attractive and effective. Is it not more probable that the witness, transforming reminiscence by reflexion, has changed parables into allegories ? This at least is Wendt's opinion in regard to this passage, for he finds here companion parables. ' The first of those parables (vv. 1-5) describes how the sheep obey and follow only the shepherd who enters by the door into the sheepfold, while the one who breaks in by another way is a stranger and a robber, from whom the sheep flee. Its application, according to the explanation in vv. 7-9, is that Jesus is the one essential Mediator of salvation for men : " lam the door : by me if any man enter in he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture " (v. 9). But since this comparison of Jesus to the door of the sheep- fold, which in a merely passive sense gives entrance to the flock, makes no account of the devoted care with which Jesus ministers salvation to His people, therefore this additional idea is brought out by a second parable (from v. 10) in which the same figure of a sheepfold is employed in another relation. As the good shepherd, in contrast to the robber who will only injure the flock, and in contrast to the careless hireling who leaves it in the lurch in time of danger, devotes his life to the welfare of the sheep, so Jesus exhibits HimseK as the true Saviour, in lovingly 122 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE devoting His fife for them.' x This solution does not seem to the writer satisfactory, and he would suggest another. In v. 7 Moffatt seems right in substituting 6 irotpuriv for -i) dvpa. Verse 9, which Moffatt brackets, appears a genuine logion, but from another context ; for would Jesus not have confused His hearers if, just after calling HimseK the Shepherd, He had called HimseK the door also ? Verse 8, if it is genuine, although its tone of unqualified condemna tion of all previous teachers makes it doubtful, is a comment on v. 1. In vv. 1-5 we have a parable of the relation of the sheep to the shepherd. In vv. 7-8, 10-16 it is the relation of the shepherd to the sheep that is made prominent. Wendt does not point out clearly enough how the witness has altered the parabolic form : probably in the original parable the first personal pronoun was not used, as it is used in vv. 10, 11, 14-16, although not found in vv. 1-5, but a description of the Good Shepherd's ways was given in the third person; and the evangelist has blended explanation (his reflexions) with parable (his reminiscences). So restored, the companion parables would fall into the first of the two classes which Wendt distinguishes, i.e. that which gives ' a rule in frequently recurring cases.' 2 (ii) The teaching in these parables may be briefly summarised. His relation to His disciples is presented as that of the shepherd who in contrast with the thief and robber (His rivals and opponents) has unhindered entrance into the sheepfold, and whom the sheep willingly follow, as they know Him (x. 1-5). The evil intention of the thief is contrasted with that of the Good Shepherd (v. 10). This forms the transition 1 The Teaching of Jesus, Eng. tr., i. pp. 128-129. 2 Op. cit. p. 117. THE JUDGMENT 123 from the one to the other parable. The desertion of the sheep by the hireling in time of danger is next contrasted with the Good Shepherd's devotion to their interests even to death (vv. 12-15). In v. 16 Jesus looks beyond the immediate present, the circle of His Jewish disciples, to the wider range after His death of His future ministry to the Gentiles. This suggestion of a universal purpose need not be suspected. In v. 9, which probably belongs elsewhere, Jesus asserted that faith in Him, such as the blind man had exer cised, was the condition of even beginning the life of discipleship. (e) The intimation of the voluntary sacrifice (x. 17, 18) follows easily and simply on the teaching about the Good Shepherd, who is ready to lay down His IKe for the sheep. It is appropriate to the occasion, for Jesus knew that His enemies were purposing and intriguing for His death. He admitted that they would accomplish their end. What He was concerned to make plain to them was that the death they were seeking to inflict would nevertheless be a voluntary sacrifice on His part in loving obedience to God and loving solicitude for man, and would be approved of God as evidence of the identity of His purpose with God's (vv. 17-18 and 30). The declaration in v. 30 is not improbable, K we do not impose on it the meaning of later dogmas, but understand it as the context indicates. The words are not to be interpreted metaphysically, whatever metaphysical inferences may or may not legitimately follow. The neuter ev does not signKy unity of substance, and the plural ia/ie'v difference of person. It is unity of purpose which is primarily intended, and the words must be inter preted morally and religiously. It is the Son's obedience to the Father's commandment which makes 124 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE Him one with the Father. His opponents were not sound Christian theologians, because He did not make HimseK God in the sense they meant (v. 33). The attempt to stone Him (v. 31) for His supposed blas phemy in claiming deity evoked a seK-defence which confirms this view. It is based on the use of the word gods in the Psalms for God's messengers. While He does not place HimseK merely on an equality with the persons to whom the word of God came, it is as sanctified and sent into the world that He claims to be the Son of God (vv. 31-36). He then offered as the test of His claim to faith the conformity of His actions to God's will. The mutual immanence of Father and Son is proved by moral resemblance (vv. 37-38). This mutual immanence is not unity of substance. It is not the correctness or otherwise of the orthodox formula that is here in question, but the historical exegesis of the passage. Another attempt at arrest followed, and compelled withdrawal from Jerusalem ; but many disciples had been won (vv. 39-42). (4) The Raising op Lazarus and its Results (xi.) (a) The raising of Lazarus from the dead raises the problem of miracle in a very acute form. For the naturalistic explanation of the acts of healing as moral therapeutics it must appear as an absolute impossibility, and so the record must be rejected as entirely unhistorical. Whether a rationalistic explanation as restoration from a prolonged trance 1 1 Mr. Edward Grubb has resort to this explanation. He prepares for it by calling attention to ' the agitation of Jesus continuing until he reached the tomb,' and accounts for that agitation by the assump tion that ' Jesus was seeking with the most intense earnestness to know His Father's will, which had not yet been fully revealed to Him.' When ' He saw clearly what He was to do, He called Lazarus from the tomb, and Lazarus came.' Then follows his explanation : THE JUDGMENT 125 has any probability from the standpoint of modern medical science is a question which the writer claims no competence to decide. (i) This is not the only instance in the Gospels of the raising of the dead by Jesus. The case of the daughter of Jairus is recorded by the three Synoptists (Matt. ix. 18-26 ; Mark v. 35-43 ; Luke viii. 49-56). The words of Jesus, ' she is not dead, but sleepeth,' are interpreted in two ways. ' Either Jesus, con fident of His power to recall from death, speaks of death as a sleep from which He will awaken (cf . John xi. 11), or He declares that the girl is not dead, but in a trance. Wonderful insight, if the latter is the case, takes the place of wonderful power, if the former. The words are ambiguous, but the evangelists convey the impression that they are recording a restoration to fife, not a recovery from a trance.' 1 The case of the widow's son of Nain is recorded by Luke alone (vii. 11-17) ; and in this record there is no ambiguity of language. Although the circumstances do not exclude the possibility of a trance, yet it would be * I do not myself suppose that Martha's fears about the opening of the tomb were justified. I do not take it that Lazarus was so completely " dead " as to be beyond the possibility of resuscitation if the right methods could have been employed. There are death like trances which may last for many days ; and I imagine the few eases in which Jesus is reported to have raised the dead to hfe were of this character. The patients were probably beyond the power of any medical skill or methods available in those days, and would, I suppose, soon have succumbed completely if Jesus had not inter vened with a supernormal control of matter by spirit. These " miracles " I take to have been simply an extension to persons appar ently dead of His ordinary works of healing, and to have been wrought in the same way. The fewness of the reported cases suggests that He never attempted to restore the dead indiscriminately, and only did so when He had an inward intimation that it was the Divine will for Him to act.' (The Expository Times, xxxiii. p. 407.) These cases were thus providential coincidences, in which Jesus enjoyed the unerring Divine guidance. The view is attractive, if not con vincing. * ' St Luke,' in Westminster New Testament, p. 169. 126 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE a marvellous coincidence that the revival should take place at the moment when Jesus spoke the word of recall. The record in no way suggests such an ex planation. (ii) Luke is charged with outbidding in this record the common Synoptic account about Jairus' daughter who had just died (Mark v. 35). One may ask whether the difference in point of time would be as significant for the evangefist as it may appear to the modern scholar who is casting about for a naturalistic explana tion. If the reality of death is conceded, is the restoration any more marvellous after the lapse of a number of hours than after the lapse of an hour ? Do we know enough about the relation of soul and body to be able to declare confidently at what moment an irrevocable separation takes place ? We need not speculate, as do Weiss and Beyschlag, regarding this insoluble problem.1 Many scholars charge the Fourth Gospel with trying to outbid Luke's record in marvellousness. (iii) It is impossible to escape the impression that the witness or the evangefist in v. 39 desires to magnify the greatness of the miracle. If normally the process of putrefaction must have set in in the interval, we must suppose either an arrest or a reversal of the process by the miraculous power of Jesus. ' Bey schlag,' according to Bruce, "' remarks that the rjSr) o&i of Martha cannot have been intended by the writer to exaggerate the miracle by making it consist in restoring life to an already putrefying corpse. One bent on magnifying the miracle would have repre sented the interval that had elapsed from death, not as four days, but rather as four years or centuries, and would not have put the 77817 o£et in the form of a 1 See Bruce, The Miraculous Element in the Gospels, p. 200. THE JUDGMENT 127 mere inference, a mistaken one, as the author thinks.' x ' That may be so,' continues Bruce, ' but it is difficult to think of a body out of which life has fled four days as still having within it " echoes of life " as K the soul had not quite left it.' x But are not Martha's words quoted expressly to indicate the probability in the known conditions that the process of dissolution had begun. The witness has increased our difficulty by his manner of telling his story. (iv) Can the difficulty be relieved by assuming that the story of the witness has been worked over by a later hand ? Dr. Strachan traces the changes in the story to the redactor of the Gospel : ' I believe that the historical fact which fies behind the narrative is a story of the same character as the raising of Jairus' daughter. The suggestion is that R has transformed, especially in vv. 38-44, the raising of Lazarus from his death-bed into the more stupendous miracle of reviving a putrefying body. The passages assigned to R are vv. 2, 17, 19, 30, 31, 38-46. In the case of vv. 38-44, R's work and the original Johannine material are inextricably intermingled. In the account, as we have it, the miracle is performed before a crowd, and in public. Evidently R felt that the story must be altered so as to take the place in his chronological scheme of the Cleansing of the 1 The Miraculous Element in the Gospels, p. 200, note. Westcott's note in loco may here be added : ' The full significance of the words appears from a passage (cf. " Bereshith R," p. 1143) quoted by Lightfoot. " It is a tradition of Ben Kaphra's ; the very height of mourning is not till the third day. For three days the spirit wanders about the sepulchre, expecting if it may return into the body. But when it sees that the form or aspect of the face is changed (on the fourth day) then it hovers no more, but leaves the body to itself." " After three days," it is said elsewhere, " the countenance is changed " ' (St. John, p. 172). If the evangelist or redactor shared this common belief, it was dearly his intention to show that death had fully taken place without any hope of recovery. 128 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE Temple, which, in the Synoptics, provokes the hostile attention of the authorities. Note the use of the word " crowd " in chapter xii.' In a note he adds : ' Remember that there is no reason to doubt the sincerity of the witness, and that we are moving in an atmosphere of literary ethics entirely different from our own.' x This explanation would need some modification to bring it into accord with the view of the Gospel here presented. It is not likely that the redactor, the author of the Appendix and other material connected with the Synoptic tradition, so transformed the record of the evangefist, but the evangelist himseK may have worked over the report of the witness, following his tendency to exaggerate the supernaturalness of Jesus. (v) Forbes,2 as quoted by Dr. Moffatt, goes even further than Dr. Strachan. ' The whole evidence,' he says, ' points strongly to the conclusion that the evangelist, using some tradition to us unknown, and the Synoptic material mentioned, elaborated them freely into a narrative designed to be at once : (a) an astonishing manifestation of the Logos-Christ ; (6) a pictorial setting forth of the spiritual truth of Christ as Life ; (c) a prophetic prefiguration of the death and resurrection of Jesus, as shown by the fact that the names Jesus and Lazarus have the same meaning, and that the narrative forms a transition to the final struggle and to death.' 2 The writer cannot, however, assign to the evangelist so definite an intention or so deliberate an invention, so free and bold a manufacture of history in the interests of theology. He desires to guard his own mind against credulity, and, therefore, would welcome 1 The Fourth Gospel, p. 155. 2 Introduction, p. 273, quoted op. cit. p. 539. THE JUDGMENT 129 any explanation which would ascribe to a later hand a heightening of the marvel of the story as it may have been told by the witness. With some hesitation he accepts the reality of a miracle of raising from the dead on the grounds that on the one hand he cannot bring his mind to believe that whoever was responsible for the story was capable of sheer invention when he seems most desirous of conveying the assurance of truth, and that, on the other, he does not feel competent to fix the limits of the possibility of the miraculous action of the supernatural person of the Conqueror of death as the Risen Lord. (b) Apart from this wider problem of miracle, the narrative in John xi. raises other difficulties. It has been urged as an objection to the historicity of this event, that the silence of the other Gospels is in explicable. ' It is just conceivable,' says Dr. Moffatt, ' that the incident failed for some reason to be included by the Synoptic Gospels : their silence would not by itseK be absolutely conclusive against the historicity. The difficulty is to give any adequate psychological reason why so stupendous and critical an episode (witnessed ex hypothesi by all the disciples) should have failed to win a place in the Synoptic tradition, even when that tradition is admitted to be incomplete at certain points, and this difficulty is heightened by the obvious motives of the writer, who makes this miracle the pivot of the final Jewish attack on Jesus, instead of the purging of the temple, which he transfers to the beginning of the ministry.' x In spite of the concession at the beginning, this passage sets forth clearly the difficulty which the silence of the Synoptists involves, and so deserves close scrutiny. (i) The incompleteness of the Synoptic tradition 1 Introduction, p. 539. I 130 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE needs to be asserted more unreservedly, as has already been shown in a previous section, and can be explained by the limitation of Peter's knowledge or interest. He was concerned solely about the Galilaean ministry apart from the final tragedy ; and an event, however significant or crucial for the Judaean ministry, about which the Fourth Gospel is concerned, might quite probably be passed over by him. If such limitation of interest be held incredible, there remains the possi bility of his limitation of knowledge. (ii) The parenthesis in Dr. Moffatt's statement, ' witnessed ex hypothesi by all the disciples,' appears a conclusion going beyond the data. If, as has already been argued, the Twelve, though the constant com panions of Jesus in Galilee, did not accompany Him on all His visits to Jerusalem, and if there was a circle of disciples in Judaea regarding whom because of the extreme hostility of the Jewish rulers secrecy had to be maintained, when disciples are mentioned in the Fourth Gospel we are not entitled at once to assume that the Twelve are meant. If the mission of Jj^3 Seventy in Luke x. 1-20 is an historical reality, av eTvdr] XptcrTos, 1 Cor. V. 7). It likewise appears to be the primary tradition in the Synoptics. According to Mark xiv. 2 (=Matt. xxvi. 5) the plan of the Jewish rulers was to take Jesus by craft, and to put Him to death, but ' not on the feast day, lest there be an uproar of the people.' To the secondary tradition in the Synoptics is due the identification of the Last Supper with the Paschal meal ; and to this view there are several objections. ' Work was going on (Mark xv. 21 ; Luke xxiii. 56) and arms were being carried (Mark xiv. 47), both of which, as well as a meet ing of the Sanhedrin, were strictly prohibited on the feast days. Some of the details preserved in the Synoptic Gospels about what happened on the day of the Crucifixion and the day after tally, in fact, with the primary tradition, and are inconsistent with the special identification of the Last Supper and the Passover. . . . The Synoptic Gospels are inconsistent with themselves, and the Fourth Gospel intervenes in support of the better tradition.' 1 Dr. Moffatt adds a very important general considera tion : ' The recognition of this has important bearings on the whole question of early Christian tradition, for K, in one case, the typological significance of an event is proved to be derived from the event, there is a probability that in other cases an incident is not 1 Moffatt's Introduction, p. 544. THE GLORY 171 to be dismissed as unhistorical simply because it lends itseK to a religious application or moral.' x The evangelists did not invent history to illustrate doctrine, but actual history suggested doctrine to them. Dr. Moffatt also finds a confirmation of the Johannine view in Luke xxii. 15-16, where Jesus expresses His desire to eat the Passover with His disciples, and also confesses the disappointment of His hope. The writer has preferred to set forth the argument in favour of the view of the Fourth Gospel in the words of a scholar who cannot be suspected, as he himseK might be, of a bias to overestimate the value of the Gospel historically. He would, however, add one suggestion. As the witness was in close touch with the ruling classes in Jerusalem, is it not possible that he had discovered a plot to arrest Jesus in the night before the Passover, for the arrangement with Judas cannot have been made so hastily, that he let Jesus know, and that he had put his house at the disposal of Jesus for a farewell meal a day earfier than Jesus had HimseK hoped ? As he knew all the circumstances, he would retain a more accurate remembrance than the other disciples. (ii) According to Mark xv. 25, the Crucifixion took place at the ' third hour,' that is, nine in the morning ; but, according to John xix. 14, at the ' sixth hour,' that is, noon, the trial was still going on. Not only has Mark the consistent notes of time (Jesus is brought to Pilate ' straightway in the morning ' (v. 1) ; the Crucifixion takes place at nine o'clock ; and there is darkness from noon till three o'clock (v. 33)) ; but the hour mentioned in the Fourth Gospel does not seem to allow time for all the events which followed before nightfall. Mark's notes of time might be 1 Idem, pp. 544-545. 172 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE challenged on the ground that, as the slaughter of the Paschal lambs began at three o'clock, that hour would also be fixed as the time when the sacrifice of Christ was consummated ; but against this argument is the consideration that Mark places the Crucifixion on the day following the Paschal meal, as he identifies the Last Supper with it. The difficulty has been evaded in several ways. A corruption of the text in the Fourth Gospel has been assumed (an ancient solution) ; and John is supposed to have used a different reckoning of time, corresponding to the modern, from midnight to noon, but even Bishop Westcott,1 who favours this explanation, admits that this mode was unusual, and Dr. Sanday2 has given it up. Sir Wm. Ramsay appeals to the elasticity of the reckoning of time in the East ; but allowing for this to the utmost, could Mark's third hour follow John's sixth ? With Dr. Sanday we must leave the question open, only adding that while in this instance the Synoptic reckoning seems more probable than the Johannine, yet that does not justify a suspicion of general inaccuracy in the Fourth Gospel. (6) While it is beyond the purpose of this volume to attempt a minute comparison of the Fourth Gospel with the Synoptics to produce a complete harmony of their contents, we may glance at the omissions and additions in the Fourth Gospel in so far as by these we may learn something of the character of the Gospel and the qualifications of the witness. Bishop Westcott gives a useful summary of these.3 Without attempting to deal with them all, we may select the most important, (i) Why does the Fourth Gospel omit an account of the Agony in Gethsemane, and pass 1 The Gospel of St. John, p. 282. 2 Outlines, p. 147. 8 Op. cit. pp. 249-250. THE GLORY 173 at once to an account of the Arrest (xviii. 1-3) ? As the witness is not ashamed of the humanity of Jesus, but lays stress on it, we are not justified in saying that the Agony was doctrinally offensive to him, and so he passed it over. It has already been suggested that xii. 27 sounds like a faint echo of the Synoptic tradition of the scene of which he was not an eye witness. A reason may now be suggested for his absence from the Garden at the Agony, and his presence at the Arrest. If he was, as has been argued hitherto, an influential citizen of Jerusalem, connected by some close relationship, as we shall conclude in dis cussing v. 15, with the high priest, if he was the host at the Last Supper, and K he alone knew why Judas had left the board, what more probable than that, when Jesus went to Gethsemane, he went to the high priest's house to discover what was being done, and that he came to Gethsemane with or soon after the band sent to arrest Jesus ? Was the young man mentioned in Mark xiv. 51-52 (generally supposed to be that evangelist himself) sent by the witness as host to watch and bring him word of what might happen in his absence ? He had not reached the spot when Judas gave the traitor's kiss (Mark xiv. 44 ; Luke xxii. 48), and so he has not recorded it. For had he witnessed it, he who was not inclined to spare the traitor any of his infamy (cf. xii. 6) would not have passed over the shameful act. He had arrived, however, when Jesus made the voluntary surrender. While the motive which he assigns in v. 4 is in accord with his theological attitude, the effect of Jesus' presence which he records in v. 6 need not be regarded as doctrine turned into history ; for a similar power to overawe a crowd is ascribed to Jesus by Luke (iv. 30) ; and there are many authentic 174 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE instances of such influence exercised by a strong personality.1 Jesus' appeal that His disciples should be spared (v. 8) is quite consistent with His character, even although the reason given for it in v. 9 again betrays the standpoint of the witness or the evangelist. If intended to indicate Jesus' motive it introduces an artificiality which we may be sure had no place in the ' inner life ' of Jesus. The mention of the name Malchus (v. 10) is not a suspicious realistic touch, but a proof of a more intimate knowledge of the household of the high priest. The words in which Jesus rebukes Peter repeat the image of the prayer in Gethsemane, and so bear the marks of authenticity (v. 11) ; and it is significant that the Fourth Gospel offers us this close link with the Synoptics. (ii) Why again does the Fourth Gospel alone record the private examination before Annas or Caiaphas (xviii. 12-14, 19-24) and omit any mention of the public trial recorded by the Synoptists ? We may here also follow the clue that has led us hitherto. The witness alone was present as a privileged spectator at the private examination, while the eleven who had forsaken Jesus at His arrest and fled made no attempt to rejoin Him for some time, even if it had been possible for them to gain admission. When Peter did venture back, it was only the influence of the disciple known to the high priest, i.e. the witness, which secured him admission to the outer court (v. 16), not the inner chamber, when the examination was going on. It is probable that as soon as the witness learned the intentions of this private conclave regard ing Jesus, the confirmation of which by the public 1 The writer's own father, during a strike of his workpeople, passed unscathed through a mob which had been threatening his death. THE GLORY 175 assembly of the Sanhedrin seemed certain, he did not wait any longer, but made his way to the palace of Pilate to use what influence he had to convey to the procurator the truth about the situation. Do not Pilate's attitude and conversation indicate that he knew more about Jesus than His accusers were imparting ; and is not a reasonable explanation the intervention in some form of the witness ? Can such an intervention explain Pilate's wife's dream (Matt. xxvii. 19) ? It must be admitted, however, that the course of the events is not made quite clear in this passage. It has been argued in chapter iv. that the story of Peter's fall is an insertion by the redactor, and that this has led to other displacements. Making the changes there suggested, the order of events becomes clear. Taken to the house of Annas for some purpose of which we are now ignorant, and of which the witness may not have had personal knowledge, as he may not have had so free access to the house of Annas as of Caiaphas (vv. 13-14), Jesus was sent bound to Caiaphas, by whom the private examination was conducted (v. 24). The witness, ' another disciple,' secured Peter's admission to the court in the palace of Caiaphas (vv. 15-16),1 but he himseK went with Jesus into the house, and heard the examination (vv. 19-23). It is a bare conjecture that Annas had been more active in securing Jesus' arrest than Cai aphas, and that the captors would therefore go to him for further directions ; but that to preserve the appearance of legality, as soon as possible the prisoner was sent to the high priest himseK. A minor point in this passage demands a brief notice. The descrip tion of Caiaphas as ' high priest that same year ; 1 The account of Peter's denials (vv. 17-18, 25-27) is not told by the witness, who was meanwhile in the high priest's house. 176 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE (v. 13 ; see xi. 49-51) is no proof of ignorance of Jewish customs, for the words do not represent the high priesthood as an annual appointment, but simply mean that for the witness the year of the death of Jesus stood out from all other years he remembered. (iii) Peculiar to the Fourth Gospel is the account of the first conference of the Jews with Pilate, and Pilate's private examinations of Jesus (xviii. 28-38a ; xix. 9-11). We may offer the same explanation as before. At the conference and private examinations the witness was present as one who had access to the governor as he had to the high priest. Probably the language of Jesus has been modified to some extent by his characteristic phraseology, and his distinctive view of truth and witness-bearing. The conversation between Pilate and Jesus does not appear at all improbable, even if we have not a verbatim report of it. Pilate was anxious to discover K Jesus cherished the political ambition charged against Him. Jesus convinced Pilate that no danger to the Roman dominion need be feared from Him. In emphasizing the spirituality of His aims He im pressed His judge as a harmless visionary. The contemptuous, sceptical question, What is truth ? suits both context and occasion. The theological interest and standpoint of the witness or the evangelist is betrayed in v. 32. Is it likely that Jesus in speaking to Pilate would have described His enemies as the Jews (cf. xiii. 33) ? The account of the Fourth Gospel covers common ground with the Synoptics as regards the offer of the release of a prisoner and the choice of Barabbas rather than Jesus (xviii. 39-40 =Matt. xxvii. 15-17, 20-21 =Luke xxiii. 16-21) ; but differs from the Synoptics in placing a scourging, a THE GLORY 177 mocking by the soldiers, and the Ecce Homo (xix. 1-5) between this choice and the call for crucifixion (v. 6). It alone reports the charge of blasphemy made by the chief priests and officers (v. 7), when Pilate refused to condemn on the political accusation, and Pilate's attempt to probe the matter to the bottom in the second private interview with Jesus (vv. 9-11). Jesus' silence at the beginning of this second interview was a rebuke of the treatment of His previous declarations by Pilate (xviii. 38) ; but it was broken in compassion to remind Pilate, who claimed the authority of judge, that his position involved the obligation of righteous judgment. There is a touch of pity in the declaration that Caiaphas' sin was the more heinous because he was using the Roman judge as his tool, and, in the indirect indication that in consenting to be so used, Pilate himseK could not remain guiltless. In all these and other additional details there is nothing that need excite our suspicion, as the witness had sources of information which the Synoptists lacked, and their accounts cannot be taken as the absolute standard of historical accuracy. In the final encounter of Pilate with the Jews (vv. 12-16), ending in his weak compliance, the Fourth Gospel is in substantial agreement with the Synoptics, although differing in details. The omission of the second mockery after the condemnation, the impressment of Simon, the lamentations of the women and Jesus' compassionate warning, the repentance of one of the robbers, is no proof of any tendency ; but rather confirms the assumption, which the writer believes all the evidence warrants, that the witness almost entirely confined himself to reporting what he had himseK seen and heard ; and this is surely a safer clue to follow in explaining both omissions and M 178 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE additions than the constant ascription of this or that tendency unless the pragmatism is quite obvious. (c) Without noticing any further details of the narrative, we may concentrate our attention on the words from the Cross reported in this Gospel alone, the last charge, the cry of bodily need, the sigh of relief, or shout of triumph (xix. 26, 27, 28, 30). (i) That the mother of Jesus was committed to the care of the beloved disciple is not in itself improbable : because the brothers of Jesus had remained unbelieving, and the tragedy of the Cross was likely to harden them in unbelief ; because he alone had a home in Jeru salem, to which he could at once take her ; and because he, with his more intimate knowledge of the mind of Jesus, could help and comfort her more than any of the Twelve. If, whenever the charge was given, he led the mother away to his home (v. 27), his absence for a time from the Cross may explain his silence regarding one or two of the sayings recorded else where : e.g. the cry of desolation may have been uttered during his absence, and we need not seek a theological explanation, (ii) Even if he reported the confession of thirst in opposition to the Docetism which he met with in his later years (cf. 1 John i. 1, iv. 2), yet such a cry is altogether probable, as a burning thirst was one of the worst tortures accom panying crucifixion. At first sight v. 28 has a sus picious appearance ; but Marcus Dods gives the true explanation : ' Jesus did not feel thirsty and proclaim it with the intention of fulfilling Scripture — which would be spurious fulfilment — but in His complaint and the response to it John sees a fulfilment of Psalm xix. 22.' x This argument from prophecy appears also in vv. 24, 36, and 37, but there is nothing 1 Expositor's Greek Testament, i. p. 858. THE GLORY 179 in any of the details in which such fulfilment is found to warrant the assumption that the prophecy made the history, (iii) Probably the saying, ' It is finished ' (v. 30), is not so much a sigh of relief as a call of triumph at an accomplished task ; but whatever be its meaning there is nothing intrinsically improbable. The witness records the phenomenon in v. 34 as an evidence of the reality of the death, and gives no hint whatever of the symbofical meaning which seems to be assigned in 1 John v. 6, although the reference there might be to the Baptism and the Crucifixion. There is no warrant for Westcott's supposition that this was a supernatural sign : ' As He hung upon the Cross He was shewn openly to be the source of a double cleansing and vivifying power, which followed from His death and fife.' x A physio logical explanation has been offered : ' Dr. Stroud (Physical Cause of the Death of Christ) advocates the view that our Lord died from rupture of the heart, and this accounts both for the speedy cessation of IKe and for the effusion of blood and water. Previous literature on the subject will be found in Critici Sacri, and select passages in Burton's Bampton Lee, 468-469. Without physiological knowledge John records simply what he saw, and if he had an eye to the Docetae as Waterland (v. 190) supposes, yet his main purpose was to certify the real death of Jesus. The symbolic significanpe of the blood and water so abundantly insisted on by the Fathers (see Burton's B.L., 167-172 and Westcott's additional note) is not within John's horizon.' 2 ' Whether medical evidence,' says Dr. Strachan,3 ' can really support the evidence for the 1 The Gospel of St. John, p. 279. 2 Dods in The Expositor's Greek Testament, pp. 859-860. 3 Op. cit. pp. 221-222. 180 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE fact on which the Evangefist is reflecting is extremely doubtful.' He offers two explanations, one taken from Burkitt's Gospel History and its Transmission (p. 233, note). ' According to 1 John v. 6-8, the living personality has in it three elements, viz. spirit, water, blood. From the " water " we are begotten ; by the " blood " we are sustained ; and the " spirit " or breath is the immaterial element that enters at birth and leaves at death. The spirit quitted Jesus when He died, leaving behind the water and the blood of a human body, the existence of which was demonstrated to the onlookers by the spear-thrust of the soldier.' According to this interpretation, the evangelist is again concerned to defend the crucifixion of Jesus against the Docetic theory that only a phantom Jesus was crucified. The other is that of Westcott already noted which is pronounced ' entirely fanciful.' If v. 35 were the witness's, we might charge him with protesting too much ; but we need not regard him as making an ostentatious display of his own trust worthiness since the verse has already been explained as an editorial gloss. (d) We must now consider more fully the signi ficance of the statement in xviii. 15, that ; that disciple was known unto the high priest.' Is it likely that a Galilaean fisherman would have such acquaintance with the high priest, and such access to his house ? Even K, as has been conjectured, John the son of Zebedee looked after the sale of his father's fish in Jerusalem, and the high priest was a customer, is the fishmonger more likely than the fisherman to have had this privileged position ? During the ministry of Jesus this John was with Jesus in Galilee, and if he were identified with the unnamed disciple who followed Jesus, he was with John the Baptist before THE GLORY 181 that ; and thus he could not have had so recent a connexion with the high priest's household as the description suggests. It has again and again been pointed out how familiar the witness was with the varied and varying states of opinion and sentiment in Jerusalem ; how well-informed he was of the designs of the priesthood against Jesus. In this discussion it has also been suggested as probable that he was an eye-witness of the private examination before Caiaphas, and also of the private interview of Jesus with Pilate. Here surely is cumulative evidence that he was a person of distinction and influence in Jerusalem. A confirmation of this view may be found in the testimony of Polycrates, bishop of Ephesus, in a letter written to Rome about 190 a.d. that ' John, too, who leaned on the Lord's breast, who had been a priest and worn the high priest's mitre (to ireTdKov), both witness (/j,dpTv<;) and teacher — he sleeps in Ephesus.' x Professor Burkitt's comment on this statement is, ' Here it is definitely implied that the Fourth Evangelist was a member of one of the high- priestly families.' 2 According to this writer, the conclusions we may draw about the evangelist are that (1) he had been a Jew of Jerusalem ; (2) he had been (as some evidence in his Gospel indicates — his views of the resurrection and angels) an adherent of the Sadducean party ; (3) he had been a priest, for he describes himseK as known unto the high priest (xviii. 15), and Polycrates ascribes to him even high- priestly functions.3 If it be objected that a disciple of such position would have been expressly mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles, we may recall what has 1 Eusebius' Ecclesiastical History, bk. v. c. 24. See Eng. trans. pp. 242-243. 2 The Gospel History, p. 251. 3 Op. cit. pp. 247-251. 182 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE been before said about what appears to be the in tentional concealment in the Synoptics in regard to the family in Bethany, and we may further observe that, K this Gospel is to be trusted, there were Judaean disciples, and yet in the history of the early Church Judaean disciples do not come into prominence. Was there a reason in some family connexion why the witness did not openly cast in his lot with the primitive community and hold a conspicuous position in it ? Did he hope by avoiding an open breach with the priesthood to continue the exercise of his influence on behaK of the disciples, as has been con jectured he did on behalf of the Master ? Can xii. 42-43 contain a personal confession ? Such questions are worth pondering. (4) The Resurrection (xx.) (a) It is not necessary here to discuss the general problem of the evidence of the Resurrection ; we are now concerned with the narrative in this chapter and the light it throws on the question of the author ship, character, and credibility of this Gospel, (i) In the first division of the chapter (vv. 1-9) the visit of Peter and the other disciple to the tomb to verify Mary Magdalene's report that it was empty is recorded. Matthew xxviii. 1-10, Mark xvi. 1-8, and Luke xxiv. 1-12, also report the discovery of the empty tomb, not only by Mary Magdalene as here, but also by other women ; but in much greater detail than in the Fourth Gospel. Probably the witness mentions the discovery of Mary Magdalene only to introduce the visit to the tomb, in which he had a personal interest. Luke records the visit of Peter alone to the tomb (v. 12) and of no other disciple. The other THE GLORY 183 disciple's hesitation to enter, the greater boldness of Peter, the beginning of faith in the Resurrection of the Lord, the confession of the failure of the disciples to understand the Scriptures, as they afterwards understood them, as foretelling the victory over death, these are all fife-like touches which inspire our con fidence. The use which Dr. Sanday x makes of one feature of the narrative — the association of the witness with Peter — as a reason for assigning the Gospel to John, the son of Zebedee will be discussed fully in the last chapter. (ii) Dr. Strachan assigns vv. 2-10 to the redactor. ' Certain reasons for assigning vv. 2-10 to R may be indicated : (1) Mary speaks as though she had not come alone. Note that in v. 13 Mary speaks in the first person singular. (2) In v. 11 Mary stands where she was in v. 1. (3) What Mary sees in v. 12 is different from what Peter and John see in vv. 6, 7. (4) Is it likely that Mary would communicate with the disciples twice in v. 2 and again with a definite commission in v. 17. In general it may be said that R tends to lay more stress on the empty grave than the Johannine writer. As in xi. 38-44 and in xx. 24-29, he probably has in mind those who could not rest upon the spiritual experience of others as proof of the resurrection, but must have some assurance that the stern and ghastly facts of death and the grave were surmounted by Jesus.' 2 The reasons given above seem to the writer altogether unconvinc ing. The change from the singular (v. 1) to the plural (v. 2) and back again to the singular (v. 11) is surely explicable if Mary was joined by other women (Mark xvi. 1), and then was alone on returning to the tomb 1 The Criticism of the Fourth Gospel, p. 107, 2 Op. cit. p. 223, note. 184 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE (v. 11). It need not be assumed that she was standing at the same spot at the times referred to in v. 1 and v. 11 without any intervening departure and return. Might not the difference of her mental condition account for the difference in what she saw and heard ? Why should she not first announce with dread the empty tomb and then with joy the Risen Lord ? If the witness is the disciple referred to in v. 2, and yet he is not responsible for the narrative in vv. 2-10, the redactor seeks to represent as from him a story he got elsewhere. That Peter and he saw only the empty grave and not the Risen Lord is surely a con firmation of the trustworthiness of the record. More ground might be found for doubting the authenticity of the narrative in vv. 11-18, K it is not the empty grave which is the stumbling-block to our belief. Of vv. 2-10 there is a partial support in Luke xxiv. 12, unless that too is to be suspected. (6) In the second division of the chapter (vv. 11-18) the appearance to Mary Magdalene is reported. (i) Matthew (xxviii. 9) records an appearance to the women returning from the empty tomb without any special mention of Mary ; but she may have lingered behind at the tomb, or returned to it, and the loving and pitiful Lord, after the word of cheer to the others, may have appeared to comfort her sad heart, as He did to Peter (Luke xxiv. 34 ; 1 Cor. xv. 5) and James (1 Cor. xv. 7). That this appearance is not mentioned by Paul in 1 Cor. xv. may be explained in two ways : he may not have heard of it ; or he may have omitted the account, as of the appearance to the two disciples on the way to Emmaus (Luke xxiv. 13-35), because he confined his list to those who, as apostles, were commissioned to be witnesses of the Resurrection. Features in the record which may be noted are, the THE GLORY 185 failure of Mary to recognize Jesus, as of the two on the way to Emmaus, indicating a change in His appearance, the recognition by the tones of the voice here, as there by the movement in the breaking of bread, the prohibi tion of her loving touch, sigmfying that the former earthly relationship was ended, and a higher heavenly fellowship was to take its place. The reason why the witness recorded an appearance which was not shared by him as were the other two which he reports, may fie in the interest for him of some of these details. The declaration of v. 17 may have specially appealed to him as continuing previous declarations which he had reported (xiii. 33; xiv. 2-28; xvi. 28). (ii) The interpretation given by Dr. Strachan of the words of Jesus in v. 17 demands close scrutiny : ' Mary's mission is to tell the disciples that Jesus is ascended to the Father,' he asserts ; but is it so ? It is the present tense, 'Avafidivco, which is used, and Moffatt 1 renders by the continuous present, ' I am ascending.' It is a process still continuing during the appearances. At least this seems as possible a view as what Dr. Strachan next advances : ' The Ascension, in the view of the Evangelist, takes place some time between the events of vv. 11-18 and vv. 19-29. This is clearly implied in vv. 17-18. As a basis for faith the Resur rection is incomplete without the Ascension. Not direct from the empty grave, but from the " glory " with the Father, Jesus returns to reform the tie that had been broken, and to bestow the Holy Spirit.' 2 The base is too narrow for such a structure of speculation. (c) The third division of the chapter (vv. 19-23) contains several features of special interest, (i) In v. 19 there is an indication that it was necessary to 1 A New Translation, p. 143. 2 Op. cit. p. 226. 186 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE observe secrecy as to the dwelling and gathering-place of the disciples. A similar caution is the probable explanation of the arrangements made to secure both the guest-chamber for the Last Supper (Mark xiv. 13-14) and the ass for the Entry (xi. 2-4). If in all three cases the witness himseK was the unnamed friend and helper, may we not here find the clue to the silence of the Synoptic tradition regarding so influential a disciple ? He risked much in rendering the services he did, owing to the greater enmity which would probably have been turned against him by the priesthood. His abifity to befriend may have depended on his not coming too much out into the open ; and gratitude as well as prudence enjoined silence regarding him. (ii) Although we must not press the details too hard, yet the narrative suggests that Jesus appeared in the midst of the disciples suddenly, the doors remaining closed. This is one with other indications that the risen body of Jesus was not subject to ordinary physical conditions ; and yet it could at will apparently be made accessible to the sense both of sight (v. 20) and of touch (v. 27) with proof of identity. Another token is offered in the corresponding passage in Luke (xxiv. 41-43). Jesus eats before them. To meet the objection to so complete a materialisation of the resurrection body Bernard a offers the following argu ment : ' This ' (proof of identity), he says, ; with a view to the persons dealt with, could be best done by taking food. If there be a resurrection of the body, there is no reason why such a body should not have the power of taking food without depending on it. Once cross the boundary of the present sphere of existence and we are in a realm where we can no 1 Hastings' Bible Dictionary, iv. p. 234- THE GLORY 187 longer say, " this is impossible." Indeed it was the reality and identity of the risen body which the Lord had to insist on : the difference was evident, and spoke for itseK.' While admitting the possibility here mentioned, several considerations forbid confidence. First of all, why does the witness, who ex hypothesi was present, mention only the proofs of sight, sound, and touch ? Secondly, the intention of the passage in Luke is ostentatiously apologetic. It is difficult to believe that the risen body had flesh and bones, even if it had power of manKestation to the various senses of sight, sound, and touch in proof of its reality. Thirdly, while in the Appendix to this Gospel it is not expressly stated that Jesus HimseK took food, He is represented as dividing bread and fish among His disciples (xxi. 12, 13). This trait may belong to a late tradition, and we are at least justified in suspending judgment as to its trustworthiness. (iii) There is nothing to excite suspicion in the words ascribed to the Risen Lord. We may admit the possibility that some of the sayings ' summed up the Church's confession of faith conceived as uttered by the lips of the Risen One.' x The action and words in v. 22 are to be regarded as symbolically prophetic, as in Luke (xxiv. 49) a promise is given, which was fulfilled at Pentecost, unless the witness anticipated events in his record, as has been conjectured in other instances. Verse 23 recalls the logion in Matthew (xvi. 19) ; and for such a declaration the context in the Fourth Gospel seems more appropriate than that in the First. (iv) The possibility of an anticipation of events by the witness is affirmed as an actuality by Dr. Strachan : ' Whatever difficulties it may occasion in 1 Bruce in The Expositor's Greek Testament, i. 340. 188 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE our minds, there is no doubt that the Evangelist here describes what for him is equivalent to Pentecost (Acts ii. 1). Luke separates by a definite interval of time the Ascension and Pentecost (Acts i. 8). In the thought of the Fourth Evangelist, the gKt of the Holy Spirit is the climax of the Resurrection. The Cross, Resurrection, Ascension, Pentecost are all moments in one great event (cf. xii. 31-32). They are, as it were, telescoped.' 2 The writer is convinced that we do wrong to the witness in assuming that he is wiKully departing from the common tradition of the Church, without trying to discover some explana tion which preserves the historical value of his narrative. If Pentecost was the culmination of a process of spiritual recovery in the Christian Church from the loss of faith and hope, due to the death of Christ, as the certainty that Christ had risen was more and more realized, is it not reasonable to suppose that the process may have begun in the Upper Room with the leaders of the Christian community, and from them may have spread, until the whole com munity was reached ? At least this must be recognized as a possibility. (d) The fourth division (vv. 24-29) presents four points for notice : (i) The representation of the disposition of Thomas here is quite consistent with the two other references in this Gospel. He expects death as the result of the return to Bethany, and yet he is prepared to run the risk (xi. 16). He cannot understand how the disciples can be expected to know the way when they know not whither the Master is going (xiv. 5). He was despondent, and yet devoted ; and his absence may have been due to the utter overthrow of his faith by his grief. 1 Op. cit. p. 228. THE GLORY 189 (ii) The presence of the disciples in Jerusalem after ' eight days ' demands explanation, in view of the command given to depart into Galilee (Matt. xxviii. 10 ; Mark xvi. 7). Was it the unbelief of the disciples that kept them from instant obedience, and so necessitated the appearance of Jesus on the first occasion to awaken their faith ? Could His loving heart no longer delay in giving them the comfort they needed ? Did they consider the first appearance in Jerusalem as cancelling the command to go to meet Him in Galilee ? We can but ask these questions. At least the narrative does not contain any rebuke or reproach for disobedience. (iii) The exclamation of Thomas (v. 28) when convinced of the reality of the Risen Lord, whether by touch or by the words uttered, is difficult to accept. ' His faith returns,' says Dr. Dods, ' with a rebound and utters itseK in a confession on which the Gospel culminates. The words are not a mere exclamation of surprise.' 1 But even if Thomas fully shared Peter's confession of Jesus as the Messiah, the Son of the Living God, this faith falls short of the recognition of divinity such as is here affirmed. This confession goes beyond the doctrine of the early apostolic preaching. It shows a lack of historic sense when Dr. Dods adds in confirmation, ' In Pliny's letter to Trajan (112 a.d.) he describes the Christians as singing hymns to Christ as God,' for a considerable doctrinal development had intervened. Here again the witness anticipates the development, and puts on the lips of Thomas the doctrine which his Gospel aims at proving. (iv) Jesus' answer gives no indication that so advanced a confession had been made, proving a faith 1 The Expositor's Greek Testament, i. 866. 190 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE beyond that any other disciple had reached ; for surely words of commendation must in that case have been deserved and bestowed, and not the censures that Thomas' faith resting on sensible evidence was inferior to the faith resulting from moral insight and spiritual discernment regarding His person and work. The witness, however, does teach a physical and not only a spiritual resurrection, for he records the empty grave, and the sensible proofs of some kind of con tinuity between the buried and the risen body ; and of both he claims to write as an eye-witness. If we accept him as at all trustworthy, we must in forming our conception of the resurrection reckon with the fact. (v) This whole passage Dr. Strachan also assigns to the redactor : ' Not without some hesitation vv. 24-29 are here assigned to B. The following reasons may be given. It must not, however, be supposed that by assigning the passage to B the devotional value and psychological truth of it are in any way minimised. (1) The Gospel naturally reaches its finale at vv. 22-23. (2) The occurrence described in vv. 24-29 is not in the writer's mind in vv. 22-23 ; otherwise it would mean that Thomas was excluded from the gift of the Spirit. (3) The spurious ending to Mark (xvi. 19-20) is evidently based, at least partially, on John xx. The writer agrees in assigning the first appearance to Mary ; then he mentions the Emmaus incident, then an appear ance to the eleven. There is no room here for a final appearance to Thomas.' 1 Not one of these reasons seems to the writer at all convincing. Verse 29 seems a very fitting close. If vv. 22 and 23 do not describe Pentecost, the second reason does not hold at all. 1 Op. cit. p. 230, note. THE GLORY 191 Should the omission in a spurious document cast discredit on a narrative included in an authentic one ? The witness seems to have had a personal interest in Thomas (cf. xi. 16 ; xiv. 5). (e) A formal conclusion is given to the Gospel by vv. 30-31, which indicate that there has been a selection of the material which has been presented, and that the selection has been made with a distinct doctrinal and practical purpose. It may be due to the witness himseK, but on the whole it is more probable that it belongs to the evangelist. But, as has been shown in the course of the previous discussion, the additions or omissions in comparison with the Synoptic records are not to be explained exclusively from this point of view. The witness's own personal presence or absence must be recognized as an explanation of the inclusion or exclusion of some incidents : as for the most part the Gospel is the testimony of an eye witness who had a distinctive personal interest in what he saw and heard, remembered, reflected on, and then reported. This consideration justifies the conclusion that vv. 30-31 express the evangelist's rather than the witness's intentions. The attempt has been made in the previous discussion to show, wherever it is to be traced, the influence of theology on history, and yet to prove that we must not so exaggerate this influence as on account of it to regard the history as unauthentic. It is in opposition to any such tendency that the writer has had occasion in a number of instances to express his dissent from the opinion of Dr. Strachan. His is one of the most recent works upon the subject, and is fikely to reach a very much wider circle of readers than most books on such a subject do. It is a work of very great learning and ability. It represents the critical position with 192 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE moderation of tone and evident desire to assert the spiritual and moral value of the Gospel ; and yet the impression it leaves is that theology so determines the choice and the presentation of the material that any historical character must be denied to the Gospel. The frequent references to the book show, not de preciation, but appreciation of its value. Its main conclusion the writer's studies have led him most strenuously to contest, with what success or failure he must leave it to the readers of this volume to judge. (/) In the record of the Resurrection there emerge a few matters of theological interest, (i) Attention must first of all be called to the evidence regarding the resurrection-body, personal identity as regards voice and gesture, transcendence of the physical limitations of the material organism, capacity to give at will sensible tokens of reality, and, less certainly proved, a gradual transition from the natural to the spiritual body. So far as we allow ourselves to be guided by the record we cannot assert a merely spiritual resurrection, an unwarranted use of the word resur rection, if only a survival of the body by the soul is intended : but must assert a physical resurrection in the sense not of material identity of the buried and the raised body, but at least of some continuity in the organ of the spirit corresponding to its un changed identity. Paul's statement (1. Cor xv. 50-53) suggests what the process may have been, although it may not have been effected ' in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye.' The subject is not one for dogmatic affirmations, but still less for dogmatic negations. Jesus' restraint of Mary's signs of affection indicates a cessation of the former earthly relationship of bodily contact, and a transition to the abiding THE GLORY 193 heavenly relationship of spiritual communion (xx. 13-17). (ii) While Jesus is represented as distinguishing His relation to the Father from that of the disciples (else He had said ' our '), it is significant that He speaks of the Father as : my God.' The confession ascribed to Thomas, ' My Lord and my God,' seems to go beyond Jesus' own claim. His teaching had not prepared any of the disciples for such a declaration. (iii) It has already been argued that we need not regard the witness as antedating Pentecost in his account of the meeting in the Upper Room. It is not impossible that the symbolic prophecy did include (v. 23) a separation of the apostolic company to the function of representing Christ in declaring to men God's forgiveness or judgment ; but we must beware of reading into the words later ecclesiastical pre tensions. The possession of the Spirit is the condition for the exercise of this or any other spiritual function in the Church of Christ, and only as the Church is conscious of the gKt can it without any arrogance exercise the authority so entrusted. In keeping with this insistence on the spiritual qualifications is Jesus' rebuke of Thomas' desire for an outward sign, though that was granted, in His exaltation of the faith which requires no proofs of sense over the faith that rests on such evidence (v. 29). If the signs of v. 30 are miracles, then the evangefist was mistaken in his method of proof, and inconsistent with the witness's record of what Jesus HimseK desired as an acceptable faith. !N IX THE JESUS CHRIST OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL (a) This is not intended to be a systematic treatment of the theology of the Fourth Gospel, as this volume is concerned with the composition, authorship, and trustworthiness of the Gospel. All that will be attempted is a discussion of the characteristics of Jesus Christ as He is presented in the Gospel. Most of the teaching will come into view, as here Christ is all, and in all. In this inquiry we shall also be finding an answer to the two questions, What did the witness know of the historical Jesus ? What was his experi ence of the living Christ ? An adequate Christology must take account of both. The secondary elements, due to the evangelist and to the redactor, must be left out of account, as we want to know not what was taught in later theological developments, but what conception was formed by one whose knowledge was rooted in history and grew in experience, (i) Jesus appears filled with holy enthusiasm, as one conscious of fulfilling a vocation, probably that of the suffering Servant of Yahveh (Isaiah diii.) ; and confident that He can restore the religion which priests and scribes are destroying ; can give men such a knowledge of God as will enable them to worship aright, and can satisfy man's deepest need. Assured of open com munion with God, He expertises a searching insight into the moral and spiritual condition of men ; and, guided by that insight, He 194 chooses the followers who JESUS CHRIST OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL 195 can receive His message, demands an entire inward change in the seK-satisfied Pharisee, and distrusts the befief which His miracles excite in the multitude. Superior to, and confessed such by His forerunner, He acts independently of human advice in constant and entire dependence on God's guidance. In doing His works of healing, even on the Sabbath, He is but imitating the constant activity of His Father, of whom He has perfect knowledge, by whom He is perfectly loved, and to whom He ever renders perfect obedience. (ii) As His mission from God is certified by His forerunner, His works, His own seK-knowledge, and even the Holy Scriptures, unbelief in Him must be due to an evil choice, the issue of an evil nature. He offers HimseK as the full satisfaction of man's need of God, as the Bread from Heaven, the Living Water, and the Light of the World. To those who believe in Him He imparts abounding spiritual power, liberation from the bondage of sin, and deliverance from the grasp of death. Not only will He discharge the function of the Judge of men hereafter, but He is already exercising a present judgment. Resistance of Him reveals a nature from beneath, descent not from Abraham, but from Satan, and so involves final condemnation. Salvation, the possession of the eternal IKe, is possible only through faith in Him, who is the Door, and this faith God gives. His relation to believers is that of the Good Shepherd watching over, caring for, and even giving His fife on behaK of His sheep, and of the Vine to the branches, the source of all their sufficiency for service. Intimacy with Him, dependence on Him, love for Him, and obedience to Him, are the marks of His own sheep, His living branches. (iii) He anticipates His own death voluntarily 196 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE endured, not only as a token of His devotion to His own sheep, and as a proof of His obedience to His Father, but as the necessary condition of His universal spiritual effectiveness among men. He must be IKted up on the Cross from the Grave, to Heaven, to secure eternal fife for all men, and to win all to Himself. Not in His words and works only, but also in His sacrifice is He the sustenance of the soul of man. His death is His glorification, but also the world's judgment because of its unbelief, and Satan's over throw. (iv) His death leads to His further glorification in His return to the Father ; His recovery of the dignity that He had before the world was, due to the eternal love of the Father for Him. His consciousness of pre-existence is rooted in and springs from His sense of oneness with God, and gains certainty the more His claim is challenged. While His return to God in His death means a temporary separation from His disciples, He anticipates a speedy reunion, not under the former earthly conditions, but in their inward experience of His presence and power in the other Paraclete. The Spirit of Truth, the Holy Spirit, will recall His teaching to them, unfold the meaning hitherto hidden from them, lead them into all truth only to make Him, and God the Father in Him, the better known, and the more real to them, in a relation which will inspire confidence in prayer, and sufficiency for service, and will issue in a human unity of believers corresponding to the divine unity of the Father and the Son. (v) As He lives, so do those who are joined to Him by faith live the eternal fife : as He goes to Heaven, so He prepares an abode for them in Heaven. While on earth they will be persecuted as He has been ; JESUS CHRIST OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL 197 but as He has conquered the world, so, while they are still in the world, God will keep them from the evil, and amid its trials and sorrows they will share the peace which He has won, and by their witness to Him they will secure the world's acknowledgment of His relation to and mission from God. (6) It has been impossible to reproduce every detail of the seK-witness of Jesus as given in the witness's reminiscences, coloured by his reflexions. All that has been attempted is to convey the total impression of the person and work of Christ as pre sented by the witness. His reminiscences have often been so coloured by his reflexions that they cannot be distinguished ; at other times reminiscences and reflexions do seem distinguishable. We cannot with confidence separate in all cases these reflexions of the witness from the evangelist's comments, although some instances where we can have already been noted. In what follows an effort is made to show how the presentation has been affected by these secondary elements, (i) It is probable that the disclosures of Messiahship by Jesus, and the confessions of it by others, are antedated. The faith of a later period of the ministry is thrown back to its beginnings. (ii) The supernaturalness of the knowledge of Jesus is exaggerated, so as to give the impression that omniscience is ascribed to Him. And yet the record itseK demands only an insight and foresight corre sponding to the moral conscience and religious con sciousness of Jesus, which we may call supernatural if we will, but must not treat as a solitary miracle. There is a tendency, too, as in the account of the raising of Lazarus, to emphasize the supernatural power unduly. As regards both, however, the correc tive evidence is given, that Jesus did not primarily 198 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE base His claims on these signs, but on the relation to God as Father of which He was conscious, and the function from God on behaK of man with which He knew HimseK entrusted. (iii) In several passages the apologetic interest leads to ascribing to Jesus what cannot be otherwise described than an artificial pose. For instance, in vi. 5-6 Jesus' questioning of Philip is represented as simply a test of him, and not allowed to be a proof of any anxiety in His own mind ; in xi. 42 a most unlikely reason for Jesus' thanksgiving for answered prayer is suggested; in xii. 30 as unlikely an ex planation of the voice is given. These occur in passages which may belong to the redactor, and not the witness or the evangefist ; but in a passage which comes from the witness, the same tendency appears. In xiv. 29 and elsewhere in the farewell discourse, Jesus is reported as assigning a motive for His warnings which seems remote from His dominating purpose. (iv) It is probable that there is a disproportion in the presentation of the teaching of Jesus. While it is not unlikely that to meet vehement opposition Jesus was driven to unusual seK-assertion, and that he was also led, as a relief from this strain, to intimate seK-disclosure to a chosen few ; yet is He likely to have spoken quite so much about His relation to God as the Gospel reports ? The claim to be perfectly related as Son to God as Father we may confidently accept as the seK-witness of Jesus ; but, as the names Father and Son themselves indicate, He makes no claim to equality as His opponents alleged (v. 18c), but He acknowledges subordination (xiv. 28), depend ence, and obedience. (v) In the passage in which the evangefist or the JESUS CHRIST OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL 199 witness develops his own doctrine of the relation of Father and Son (v. 19-29, except v. 24), what is con fessed first of all is absolute dependence, complete knowledge, and so entire resemblance. If equal honour is claimed for the Son, it is because He can quicken the dead even as does the Father, and the Father hath given Him all judgment. Whether we interpret these functions spiritually or eschatologically, the statement does not go beyond what Jesus in the one case claimed for HimseK, and in the other fore told and the Church believed, about Him. And these functions, too, are exercised in dependence on the Father. If we interpret the statements eschatologic ally, that seems a reason for assigning the passage to the evangelist rather than the witness. The statement about a resurrection of the wicked to judgment has no other parallel in the New Testament, and points to a later development. If the passage, which reads like an expansion of the meaning of the Supper (vi. 51c, 52-57) is not due to the redactor, to whom we may trace most of the chapter, but is a reminiscence or a reflexion of the witness, it does no more than affirm man's absolute dependence by faith on Jesus, especially in His sacrifice, for his spiritual sustenance and satisfaction. Here already theology and religious experience blend together. Still more evident is the personal valuation in the passage (iii. 16-21), in which eternal fife is declared to depend on faith in the Son as the gift of God's love ; a contrast is presented between God's intention of salvation for all, and the result of condemnation, due to unbelief, on many ; and the explanation of faith or unbelief is sought in attraction to or aversion from truth and goodness. The severity of the witness's judgment on unbelief is the obverse of the intensity of his personal 200 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE devotion to Christ, and the absolute value which his personal experience of Christ led him to ascribe. (vi) While we are justified in distinguishing theo logical explanations from experimental reflexions, and assigning less significance for to-day to the one than to the other, the witness would make no such psycho logical analysis, but would ascribe the total repro duction in his consciousness of the historical reality of Jesus to the instruction and the illumination of the Spirit whom Christ promised, and whom the com munity of believers was confident of having received not by measure (iii. 34). An inference as to the inner life of Jesus from his own consciousness of Spirit-filled IKe would be drawn by him, if the A.V. rendering, ' God giveth not the Spirit by measure unto Him,' were correct. He would represent the relation between the Father and the Son as mediated by the Spirit, the germs of a trinitarian doctrine. Such a doctrine would be far removed from metaphysical abstractions, and would keep close to experimental reality ; but the interpretation cannot be pressed. Apart from it, however, there is abundant evidence for this char acteristic of the Gospel. The passages dealing with the Holy Spirit, scattered throughout the farewell dis course, are as significant for the light which they throw on the witness's experience as on the teaching of Jesus ; for here surely reminiscence is developed by reflexion, and the promise expands in the fulfilment. The writer must express his conviction that many scholars have been led astray in their interpretation of the Gospel by seeking in it speculative metaphysics instead of the reality of the experience of Christ HimseK, and of Christians. The reflexions no less than the reminiscences disclose the historical reality of the Christ as He lived on earth, and as He no less JESUS CHRIST OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL 201 lived in one of His disciples. The Johannine inter pretation is no less valuable for Christian thought than the Pauline ; and both are experimental, and not merely or mainly speculative. (vii) The Prologue which was intended to commend the Gospel to contemporary thinkers has been a stumbling-block to many modern scholars, as they have tended to interpret the Gospel through it. It must, however, be regarded as a porch to the temple of somewhat discordant style. In so far as there is accord, it is because the Gospel has modified the borrowed philosophy and not been to any great extent determined thereby in either its contents or its method. We must not, however, dismiss it as of no importance. If Jesus has the absolute value for the moral and religious fife of man for his relation to God which the Gospel assigns to Him, the meta physical significance as Word or Logos which the Prologue assigns is not in contradiction to, but in consistency with, that valuation. He who reveals God to man, and redeems man to God, must stand in a relation to God which demands some such solution. Theology must find a place for Him in the eternal nature of God corresponding to His place in the temporal history of man. To fix His place in the one or the other it must not neglect but give attention to the presentation in all its aspects in the Fourth Gospel of the historical personality of the Incarnate Word of God. X THE AUTHORSHIP OF THE GOSPEL In the previous discussion of the composition of the Gospel, three sources have been indicated : (1) The Prologue and some Comments in the Gospel have been assigned to the evangelist who was a disciple of the witness, and stood in a similar relation to him as did Mark to Peter. (2) The Appendix and some insertions in the Gospel, having affinity with the Synoptic tradition, have been ascribed to the redactor, whose motives have already been adequately dis cussed. (3) When these two sources have been separated, there remain the reflexions and the reminis cences of the witness, whom the writer identifies with ' the disciple whom Jesus loved,' but not with John the son of Zebedee. In justifying his conclusion, the writer will not only more fully develop his argument for it, the data of which have already been indicated, but will take fuller account of contrary opinions than has hitherto been done. First of all, the personality of the beloved disciple must be briefly described. (1) ' The Disciple whom Jesus loved ' (i) He was a Judaean, and probably even a young, rich, and influential citizen of Jerusalem, closely con nected with the family of the high priest, if not himseK a priest, and an adherent of the Sadducean party. His dominating interest is in the progress of Jesus' 202 THE AUTHORSHIP OF THE GOSPEL 203 seK-testimony and the growing unbelief and hate provoked by it in the Jewish leaders and teachers ; and he again and again shows an intimate knowledge of the conflicting currents of opinion among the people and the secret machinations of the hostile party. If, as has been maintained, the sixth chapter is an insertion by the redactor, he had no interest in the Galilaean ministry as Peter had not in the Judaean. Probably he provided both the ass for the triumphal entry and the guest-chamber for the Last Supper, and was also able, owing to his rank and wealth, to offer some protection and hospitality to the company of disciples. A constant companion of Jesus at the beginning of His ministry, but not one of the Twelve in Galilee, he renewed his contact with Jesus only at the visits to Jerusalem. He enjoyed, however, a peculiar intimacy, as did others outside of the apostolic circle, such as the family in Bethany. (ii) As an appreciative and sympathetic hearer, it is probable that Jesus laid bare to him His inner life as He could not even to the Twelve. The difference of the Synoptic and the Johannine reports is, if not entirely, yet to a large extent, explicable by two circumstances. In His public utterances in Judaea Jesus was urging His claim on the Jewish people through its representatives, the priests and scribes, and He exercised less reserve than in Galilee, for the peril of a mistaken Messianic movement was absent ; and He gave more advanced teaching doctrinally, as He was addressing HimseK to a learned class and not the unlearned masses. In His private conversa tions He was confiding His secrets to a companion who could understand. Owing probably to family influences the witness did not confess Jesus openly, but kept in the background in the early Church, so 204 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE that he is not mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles and the Pauline letters. But even in his later years he did not reveal his name, and probably it was out of respect to his wishes that the disciple who reported what he had taught did not betray his secret, but gave as a tribute of his affection the description of him as ' the disciple whom Jesus loved,' K that description is not itseK a humble seK-confession, and a grateful adoration of Christ on the part of the witness. The same silence regarding the family of Bethany is found in the Synoptics, and probably for the same reason. This account is in all particulars based on the data discussed in detail in the preceding pages ; and it offers a consistent, and to the writer at least a con vincing, picture. It has served him so well as a clue in the labyrinth of the Gospel that he desires to share with others the help it has brought to him. (2) The External Evidence It may be objected that the tradition that John the son of Zebedee was the author bars the way to this account, (i) Dr. Drummond, after an exhaustive and searching discussion of the external evidence for the traditional belief, concludes that ' the attestation is per fectly unanimous in favour of the early date of the Gospel, for in this even the dubious Alogi are supporters of the Catholic view ' ; but that ' the second point, that the Apostle John was the author, can hardly claim the same degree of confidence.' He admits, however, that ' K the Gospel was issued soon after the apostle's death by some writer who chose to keep himseK unknown, and on the ground either of its own title or of internal evidence was pronounced to be John's, and generally accepted as such, the phenomena of the existing THE AUTHORSHIP OF THE GOSPEL 205 attestation would be sufficiently explained ; in other words, we have no testimony which affords us any security against an error of this kind.' x It is true that he holds such an error not probable ; but he leaves us with a door not altogether closed, but at least ajar. The authorship by John the son of Zebedee is not a certainty, but only a probability. Dr. Sanday states his aim as follows : ' I propose to defend the traditional view, or (as an alternative) something so near to the traditional view that it will count as the same thing.' 2 The alternative referred to is Delff's theory that the evangelist was not the apostle, the son of Zebedee, but the disciple whom Papias mentions separately and describes as the presbyter. While he inclines still to the traditional view, he admits the possibility of this theory. He too, therefore, allows that we are not shut up to the authorship of John the son of Zebedee. (ii) His statement of the alternative view to which he refers deserves quotation : ' The hypothesis which ascribes the Gospel to John the Presbyter has taken different forms, some more and some less favourable to the historical truth and authority of the Gospel. From a conservative point of view the most attractive form of the hypothesis is that put forward by the late Dr. Hugo Delff of Husum in Hanover, to some extent adopted and defended by Bousset in his com mentary on the Apocalypse, and by one or two others. The theory is that the beloved disciple was not of the number of the Twelve, but that he was a native of Jerusalem, of a priestly family of wealth and standing. We are expressly told that he was " known 1 An Inquiry into the Character and Authorship of the Fourth Gospel, pp. 348-349. 2 The Criticism of the Fourth Gospel, p. 3. 206 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE to " the high priest (John xviii. 15) ; and he seems to have had special information as to what went on at meetings of the Sanhedrin (vii. 45-52 ; xi. 47-53 ; xii. 10 ff.). These facts are further connected with the statement by Polycrates, Bishop of Ephesus, towards the end of the second century, that the John who lay upon the breast of the Lord " became, or acted as, priest, and wore the frontlet of gold " (Eus. H.E. v. 24, 2 ff.). This John is claimed as one of the "great fights" of the Churches of Asia.' x In view of the account given of the composition of the Gospel in this volume, the writer is not prepared without reserve to assent to the identification of the beloved disciple with John the presbyter ; for it seems to him as probable (if not more probable) that the evangelist was John the presbyter, and that the redactor, who did not distinguish the evangelist and the witness, was led by the name to assume that the Gospel came from John the son of Zebedee. To this we must return. (iii) In support of the view that John the presbyter may be distinguished from the apostle John the son of Zebedee, the statement of Papias may be quoted : ' If then, any one came, who had been a follower of the elders, I questioned him in regard to the words of the elders — what Andrew or what Peter said, or what was said by Philip, or by Thomas, or by James, or by John, or by Matthew, or by any other of the disciples of the Lord, and what things Aristion, and the presbyter John, the disciples of the Lord, say.' 2 Eusebius draws the obvious inference that two persons, bearing the same name John, are here referred to, 1 The Criticism of the Fourth Gospel, p. 17. 2 Quoted by Eusebius, H.E. iii. c. 39, Eng. trans, by McGiffert, p. 171. THE AUTHORSHIP OF THE GOSPEL 207 although, in accordance with the fixed tradition of his time, he identifies the first with the evangelist, and conjectures that the second may have seen the Revelation, K it was not the first. He also refers in confirmation of his view to the statement that there were two tombs in Ephesus, each of which is called John's (attested also by Dionysius of Alexandria and Jerome). Even if we lay stress on the difference of tense, et7rei> and Xeyovoiv, it is surely too subtle an explanation that not two persons but two methods of reporting are referred to here, the one written, the other oral. (iv) The early martyrdom of John the son of Zebedee is accepted by a number of scholars as a probable fact on the evidence of the De Boor Frag ment,1 an epitome of the Chronicle of Philip of Side (about 430 a.d.), and the ' Papias tradition ' as given by Georgius Monachus or Hamartolos, a writer of the ninth century, (a) The first statement runs thus : ' Papias in his second book says that John the Divine and James his brother were slain by Jews.' 2 The second is fuller : ' Papias, the bishop of Hierapolis, having become an eye-witness of this one, declares in the second book of the Oracles of the Lord that John was put to death by the Jews, having evidently fulfilled with his brother the prediction of Christ concerning him, and his own confession and assent in regard to this.' 3 (6) The first statement does not necessarily involve that the martyrdoms of the two brothers were con temporaneous. The author of the second in the same paragraph excludes that inference in the words : 1 It is so called from its discoverer, and was first published in Texte und Untersuchungen, v. 2, p. 170, in 1888. 2 Quoted by Burkitt, The Gospel History, p. 252. 3 Quoted by Drummond, An Inquiry, p. 228. 208 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE ' After Domitian, Narva reigned one year ; and he, having recalled John from the island, dismissed him to five in Ephesus.' This prolongs John's IKe till a.d. 96-98 at least. It is of course possible that here there is a confusion of John the son of Zebedee and John the elder. Burkitt states that ' the state ment is historically of importance, not because these late chroniclers had independent knowledge of the facts, but because they base their information on Papias.' 1 But Papias may have been misunderstood. For there is evidence that Georgius misunderstood Origen when he appealed to him 'as saying in his commentary on Matthew that " John hath suffered martyrdom," ' for when we go to the original we find that Origen saw in the exile to Patmos and what was suffered there a sufficient fulfilment of Christ's words regarding the cup that he and his brother should drink.2 (c) To the trustworthiness of this statement Dr. Sanday objects on the one hand ' that this statement appears in no other early authority, and especially that no hint of it is found in Eusebius,' and on the other that ' the common tradition of the Church did not ascribe to St. John a violent death.' 3 A suspense of judgment seems here necessary. If the son of Zebedee was his brother's companion in an early martyrdom, and the fact was not generally known, one can understand that another John, living in Ephesus, and also bearing witness as a disciple of Jesus, might be confused with him. But even if this early martyrdom is not proved, the identity of the son of Zebedee with the John of Ephesus is not established. 1 Op. cit. p. 252. 2 The Fourth Gospel in the Light of Modern Scholarship, by A. T. Robertson in Constructive Quarterly, v. pp. 675-676. 3 Op. cit. p. 107. THE AUTHORSHIP OF THE GOSPEL 209 After the end of Acts we have certain historical evidence only about Peter. (v) Although Dr. Drummond and Dr. Sanday admit the possibifity of the confusion of the author of the Fourth Gospel, especially if his name were known to be John, with the son of Zebedee, yet some writers on the external evidence assume that this possibility need not be taken into account. (a) In the article by Dr. A. T. Robertson, referred' to in a previous page, a number of unproved assump tions are made, to which attention may be called. Authorship by John the son of Zebedee is not neces sary for the historical trustworthiness of the Gospel, nor for its genuineness, nor for its sufficiently early date for us to treat it as a first-hand literary source of the life of Jesus. If it was written, as is here maintained, by a disciple who was present wherever the presence of the beloved disciple is asserted, who had better sources of information about Jewish conditions than a Galilaean fisherman was likely to have, who says so little (K anything) about the Gali laean ministry, and so much about the Judaean because he was, not a Galilaean but a Judaean, and because he was with Jesus in the one, and not the other, the value of the Gospel is in all respects enhanced. To insist on the authorship of the son of Zebedee is not to strengthen, but rather to weaken the position. What in this argument is being defended is not the character of the Gospel, but the infallibility of a tradition in the Church. (6) What the real issue is should at the outset be made clear. We need not concern ourselves at all for our present purpose with all the external evidence for the use of the Gospel as Holy Scripture, or for the authorship by a John. What is the conclusive o 210 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE evidence that this John was the son of Zebedee ? The ascription of it by later writers to John the apostle is not conclusive evidence. Is the author so described as to exclude any other possibility ? If Irenaeus claims as a disciple of Polycarp to have heard ' the accounts which he gave of his intercourse with John and others who had seen the Lord,' and describes the author of the Gospel as the disciple of the Lord who also lay on his breast (Ad. Haer. iii. 1), that statement is quite consistent with the authorship which is here assigned. Even if Polycarp told Irenaeus all he knew about John, what proof is there that he stated anything to fix the identity of his teacher with the son of Zebedee ? Even if he made such a statement it might have been an assumption on his part. For it has already been shown that the writer of the Gospel desired for some reason to conceal his identity. The tradition that John lived to an old age in Ephesus has no relevance as it may refer to the other John, and not the apostle as was simply assumed in later times. (c) The objections Dr. Robertson offers to the alternative which even Dr. Sanday is prepared to entertain are adequately met in the view here ad vocated. The Synoptic record is incomplete as regards the Judaean ministry : and as it is almost entirely confined to the Galilaean, there was no occasion to mention a Judaean disciple. Why the beloved disciple is not mentioned in Acts, and yet appears in the Fourth Gospel as a companion of Peter, has already been explained. On the one hand he did not wish openly to identify himseK with the Galilaean circle of disciples ; and yet on the other hand he acted as host and helper to them so far as his desire for concealment allowed. John the son of Zebedee appears THE AUTHORSHIP OF THE GOSPEL 211 in pubfic with Peter in the record in Acts ; the beloved disciple goes in private with Peter to the sepulchre (John xx. 3). If he was the host at the Last Supper, and got admission for Peter to the high priest's house, he may have continued Peter's host. If he did not go from the Upper Room to Gethsemane, but to the high priest's house to find out what was being plotted as has been suggested, and sent as his messenger to Gethsemane John Mark, with whom the young man who fled naked is usually identified, a personal link is found with Peter. The exhaustive discussion about the use of the term disciple which follows in a later section will sustain the conclusion that, as the witness had no occasion to mention the sons of Zebedee, his silence regarding them is no proof that he had any feeling against them, K he was not one of them. The mention of them in the Appendix has already been fully dealt with in a previous chapter. The defence of the Gospel by Dr. Robertson against other con clusions of modern scholarship need not for our present purpose be further considered. (vi) It is clear that what is of crucial importance in respect of the external evidence is the testimony of Irenaeus, and to that a series of articles by the Rev. Dr. H. A. A. Kennedy has been recently devoted.1 For our purpose it is necessary to discover whether he establishes the identity assumed in the tradition. (a) The close connexion of Irenaeus with Polycarp need not be doubted, and Dr. Kennedy's proof of the fact may be accepted. The statement of Irenaeus already quoted in a previous page does not give any decisive evidence of the identity of the John ' who had seen the Lord,' and who had been one of ' the 1 Irenaeus and the Fourth Gospel, in Expository Times, xxix. pp. 103 ff., 168 ff., 235 ff., 312 ff. 212 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE eye-witnesses of the Word of Life.' This last phrase makes it clear that he is referring to the author of the Fourth Gospel ; but proves nothing as to his identity with John the son of Zebedee. Irenaeus may also have been acquainted with Papias, whom he describes as ' the hearer of John, and a companion of Polycarp,' and includes in ' the elders who saw John, the disciple of the Lord.' x But these statements again tell us nothing as to who this John was. If he gives no indication that he understood Papias as claiming an acquaintance with two Johns, as the passage from Papias already discussed most obviously means, that proves nothing for or against the truth of that statement. With other Church leaders who had listened to the disciples of the apostles he may also have had contact, as also Pothinus may have been for him a link with a much older generation ; but these conjectures prove nothing about the identity of the author of the Gospel. (6) What Eusebius tells us about Polycarp in connexion with the controversy about the Passover does not make his testimony any more decisive of the question before us. ' What he had always observed with John, the disciple of our Lord and the other apostles, with whom he had associated,' 2 for we are not entitled to assume that the word apostle was restricted to the Twelve, even K it was indeed used by Polycarp himseK, whatever meaning Eusebius himseK put upon it. Have we a right to impose the narrower sense of the term even when Irenaeus uses it in his statement that ' Polycarp was not only instructed by apostles, and conversed with many who had seen Christ, but was also, by apostles in 1 Ad. Haer. v. c. 33 84, Eng. trans, ii. pp. 146-147. 2 H.E. v. 24. 16, Eng. trans, p. 244. THE AUTHORSHIP OF THE GOSPEL 213 Asia, appointed bishop of the Church in Smyrna.' 1 Even if Irenaeus restricted the title to the Twelve, may not Polycarp have used the term in the sense we find in the New Testament, a sense applicable to the beloved disciple as his person is represented in this volume ? Is there any kind of evidence whatever that Polycarp came into contact with any of the Twelve, except the son of Zebedee, if the John he mentioned is indeed he ? To assume that the mention of apostles justifies the identification of this John with the son of Zebedee is going far beyond the evidence. (c) The same consideration applies to Irenaeus' further statement about the elders, ' those who were conversant in Asia with John, the disciple of the Lord [affirming] that John conveyed to them that information. Some of them, moreover, saw not only John, but the other apostles also, and heard the very same account of them, and bear testimony as to the [validity of] the statement.' 2 The statement regarding our Lord's age, for which so imposing an array of witnesses is claimed, happens to be altogether incorrect. Does this warrant our treating Irenaeus in all other appeals he makes to tradition as entirely trustworthy ? The remark of Harvey quoted in the translation as a footnote deserves reproduction : ' The reader may here perceive the unsatisfactory character of tradition where a mere fact is concerned. From reasonings founded upon the evangelical history, as well as from a preponderance of external testimony, it is most certain that our Lord's ministry extended but little over three years : yet here Irenaeus states that it included more than ten years, and appeals 1 Ad. Haer. iii. 3-4, Eng. trans, i. pp. 262-263. 2 Idem, ii. 22. 5, Eng. trans, i. p. 201. 214 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE to a tradition derived, as he says, from those who had conversed with one apostle.' If, as Dr. Kennedy concludes, Irenaeus is here altogether dependent on Papias, his claim to a connection with elders who saw John and the other apostles loses its force. Dr. Kennedy himseK recognizes that in regard to the elders, to whom Irenaeus has various references, ' it must be noted, however, that he quotes nothing from this source which has a bearing on John of Asia in his connexion with the Fourth Gospel.' Polycarp and Papias alone remain as links with this John, Polycarp certainly, Papias probably. (d) John is usually described as the disciple of the Lord. This is pressed by Dr. Kennedy into a proof that he was an apostle by this conjecture : ' Ap parently the term " disciple of the Lord " was a favourite second-century description of members of the Twelve, for Papias in the famous paragraph examined above applies the phrase to them. The same terminology is found in other writers of the period. It need scarcely be pointed out that this reflects the usage of the four Gospels, in which a7ro'- cttoXo? as compared with fiaOrjT^ is extremely rare (only once each in Mark and Matthew).' 1 Because an apostle can be called a disciple, does it follow that every disciple must be an apostle, or even every apostle one of the Twelve ? If the appeal is to be to the New Testament, does not the New Testament use both terms in a wider sense ? That second-century writers assumed that this John was one of the Twelve does not prove that he was unless evidence can be produced that they were warranted in this assumption. The second link in the chain of argument forged by 1 Irenaeus and the Fourth Gospel, in Expository Times, xxix. p. 236. THE AUTHORSHIP OF THE GOSPEL 215 Dr. Kennedy that Irenaeus reckoned this John among the apostles is not a bit strong. The instance just given of Irenaeus' appeal to apostolic authority should make us pause in claiming infallibility for him, or even ordinary care, especially where, as in controversy, he had to make out as strong a case as he could against the heretics. That the Valentinians appealed to John, the disciple of the Lord, the third link of argu ment for reasons already given is no proof that this John was the son of Zebedee. The reference to the Ephesian residence of the author of the Fourth Gospel, already mentioned, contributes nothing decisive, nor does the statement of Polycrates, already referred to. (e) Dr. Kennedy's conclusion from this statement must, however, be explicitly disproved. ' This " great luminary " of Asia is by two influential witnesses placed in the innermost circle of Jesus' disciples, which all readers of the Synoptics in the second century knew to consist of Peter, James, and John.' x In the first place it will be shown in the next section that the Synoptic representation of the disciples around Jesus, on which second -century opinion depended, was incomplete, as applying to the ministry in Galilee mainly. Secondly, natural as was the inference that the beloved disciple was John the son of Zebedee, it cannot now, in view of the considerations there ad vanced, be accepted as conclusive evidence. (/) As the statement of Papias regarding the two Johns, and the statement regarding the early martyr dom of John have already been discussed, Dr. Kennedy's references to them may be passed over ; but his defence of the accuracy of Irenaeus demands fuller notice. It is not necessary to assume that ' Irenaeus was a credulous, unreliable man, of singularly in- 1 Op. cit. p. 238. 216 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE accurate memory,' 2 to admit the possibility that he assumed the John, of whom Polycarp spoke to him, to be the son of Zebedee without evidence from Polycarp to that effect. If the witness of the Fourth Gospel chose to conceal his identity under the de scriptive phrase, ' the disciple whom Jesus loved,' or the evangefist was instructed so to conceal it, when the Gospel was published, are we not entitled to assume the possibility that he was very reticent regarding his past life even to his followers in Ephesus, and that Polycarp had nothing definite to tell Irenaeus 1 Is every scholar to-day familiar with the biography of his teacher, even when Who 's Who exists to lighten the inquiry ? That he spoke as an eye-witness would give such assurance that inquiry would not be made, and identity would be assumed. Further, is it not to transfer our methods of historical inquiry to an age which knew them not to suppose that Irenaeus questioned Polycarp, or Polycarp John, regarding his identity with the son of Zebedee ? The fact that Irenaeus ; stood in the main current of the IKe of the Church ' 2 does not warrant our assuming that he had other sources of information which did supply the lack in what Polycarp told him about John. What might have been borne to him along these main currents would have been such traditions as we have already examined, and been led to regard as incon clusive evidence. If, as has been argued, the redactor added the Appendix with a view to identifying the beloved disciple with the son of Zebedee, and felt warranted only in doing it in a tentative way, it is this sort of conjecture that might have come to Irenaeus. That a usually accurate and careful scholar may sometimes make a mistake is a fact that must 1 Op. cit. p. 312. 2 Idem, p. 313. THE AUTHORSHIP OF THE GOSPEL 217 be admitted. Two instances have come under the writer's own personal observation, a confusion between the two Sabatiers in the one case, and the two Schmiedels in the other. We may admit Irenaeus' general trustworthiness without insisting on his in fallibility. If the external evidence alone is to be regarded, there seems to be no doubt to the writer that, as Dr. Kennedy holds, the evidence of Irenaeus must be preferred to any other. But in his view the internal evidence has a claim greater than the external ; and he has no doubt that this conclusively proves that John the son of Zebedee was not the author of the Fourth Gospel. The doubt that the external evidence leaves allows us to turn from it to the internal. (vii) The external evidence, however, may throw some fight on the composition of the Gospel, (i) A conjecture has already been offered on a previous page, that this John of Ephesus may have been the evangelist, not the witness, and that the name may have led the redactor to identify the beloved disciple (the witness) with John the son of Zebedee. In Chapter I. Dr. Stanton has been quoted as holding the view that it was unlikely that the witness himseK would assimilate the teaching of Philo as the evangelist may have done. To this subject we may now return. While Dr. Stanton accepts the external evidence about the residence and activity of John the son of Zebedee ' in Asia in his latter years ' % — a conclusion which the writer has for the reasons given not accepted — and regards him as the witness behind the Gospel, he does not follow the tradition as to the authorship of the Fourth Gospel. ' The authorship of the Fourth Gospel by the Apostle John, though included in the 1 The Gospels as Historical Documents, iii. p. 279. 218 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE second-century tradition about him, cannot be regarded as therefore established. For the writing of the Gospel would be a work performed in private, of which few could have direct knowledge, while from the first there would be a general disposition to magnify the apostle's connexion with the book if he had, or could be supposed to have had, any at all. For these reasons also the statement by a later hand at xxi. 24, in regard to the contents of the preceding work cannot be taken as decisive, at least to the full extent of what it declares.' x While he thinks it improbable that a man of the mature age of the apostle John could have undergone so marked a development, as the Gospel shows, he thinks a much younger man, who as a boy had sometimes seen and heard Jesus, would answer the claim of the Gospel that the evangelist was one ' who had " seen the glory " of the incarnate Son of God,' 2 and would also be capable of so great a change of mental outlook. He denies that the expressions used can refer to spiritual vision. ' One can, however, understand,' he writes, ' that the claim in question might be made by a youth or boy, younger by some years than the Apostle John even if the latter was the youngest of the Twelve, but who could remember having sometimes himseK seen and heard Jesus, and who had derived a sense of knowledge, which was at least almost immediate, of the Divine revelation made in the Lord, by intimate association with His personal disciples very soon after His departure.' ' It fits in with this view of the writer that the acquain tance with Palestinian localities shown in the Fourth Gospel suggests that the writer had at some time lived there. He may have gone to Asia before John did, and at all events probably he did so at an age when 1 Op. cit. pp. 279-280. 2 Idem, p. 281. THE AUTHORSHIP OF THE GOSPEL 219 his mind was more supple, and it is more natural to attribute to him the capacity for producing the Fourth Gospel in the last decade of the first century, earfier than which it is difficult to place its composition.' 1 If this be a description of the evangelist which can command our assent, and K we may identify him with John the elder, surely it becomes much more intelli gible how by honest inference without any deliberate invention the authorship of the Gospel came to be assigned to John the son of Zebedee. In the con siderations advanced by Dr. Stanton against the identification of the evangefist with John the son of Zebedee, we may find confirmation of the distinction made on other grounds between the evangelist and the witness. The witness was not so assimilated to the Ephesian environment as was the evangefist ; he was probably dead before the end of the second century. (ii) This identification of the evangefist with John the elder offers us the advantage that we do not set tradition aside altogether, and can see why it went astray where it did. Dr. Bacon, however, is entirely opposed to it : 'As regards John the Elder and his supposed connexion with the author of the " Johan nine " Epistles and Gospel, we emphatically reject the idea that he has any connexion of the kind.' He pronounces irrational any attempt ' which seeks to connect the Fourth Gospel with him,' on the ground that ' the traditions actually traceable to him are the very opposite pole from the doctrine of these writings. They represent a crude millenarianism of the most pronounced type, utterly irreconcilable with the highly spiritualized eschatology.' 2 To meet this 1 Op. cit. pp. 281-282. 2 The Fourth Gospel in Research and Debate, pp. 452-453. 220 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE objection the distinction which on other grounds we have been led to make between the evangelist and the witness comes to our aid. The older eschatology is found in the passage v. 19-29, which is more probably to be assigned to the evangelist ; and one of the differences in the theology of the Epistles and the Gospel as a whole is that the First Epistle does give a place to the common apostolic hope of a speedy outward appearance of the Lord, as the Gospel except in a few additions does not. If we recall the fluctua tions in Paul's eschatology we need not deny the possibility that the Elder's ' crude millenarianism ' may have been modified, but not suppressed, by the more ' spiritualized eschatology ' of the witness. The probability, or at least the possibifity of the identi fication cannot be regarded as altogether excluded by Dr. Bacon's summary rejection of it ; critical scholars can sometimes be too dogmatic. (iii) Regarding the redactor, as to whose activity the writer finds himself in general agreement with Dr. Bacon, his words may be quoted in this connexion : ' For the author of the Appendix and recaster of the Gospel, who adjusted the Asiatic or Pauline tradition to the Petrine of Syria and Rome, we have no de signation save the title Redactor. This editor (R) gave to the Gospel its authoritative currency by his not unnatural identification of " the disciple whom Jesus loved " with the son of Zebedee, and by ascribing to him the writing and testimony. R was a contem porary of Papias, Polycarp, and Justin, probably a Roman. He doubtless believed with Papias and Justin that " John the Apostle " had been " in the Spirit " in the island of Patmos, whence he had addressed letters to the churches of Asia. What more natural than to attribute to John the anonymous THE AUTHORSHIP OF THE GOSPEL 221 Gospel also ? ' 1 If the Gospel was not anonymous, but came from another John, such ascription would be still more natural. Having considered what is relevant as regards external evidence to the present purpose, attention may now be fixed on the internal evidence as it bears on the identity of ' the disciple whom Jesus loved.' (3) The Internal Evidence (i) It will be necessary first of all to examine the grounds on which the authorship of John the son of Zebedee is maintained. (a) The writer can go with Bishop Westcott 2 entirely in the first three steps of his argument, i.e. that the author was a Jew, a Jew of Palestine, and an eye-witness (although of course referring to the witness and possibly also the evangelist) ; but the next step that he was an apostle rests on the assumption that the Twelve alone stood in so intimate relations to Jesus as the author of the Fourth Gospel appears to stand, whereas it has been shown in the previous discussion that the Twelve formed Jesus' constant companions in Galilee, but that in Judaea there were other disciples who came in close contact with Him also. ' It is not on the face of it certain,' says Dr. Sanday,3 ' that " the disciple whom Jesus loved " must have been one of the Twelve.' But it is only by assuming this as certain that Bishop Westcott is justified by the method of exclusion in taking his last step to John as the author. (a) In order to show that this assumption is invalid, it is worth while examining in detail the passages in 1 Op. cit. p. 454. 2 St. John, Introduction. 3 The Criticism of the Fourth Gospel, p. 98. 222 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE the Fourth Gospel in which mention is made of the disciples, so as to prove that the reference need not be to the Galilaean disciples in all cases, and that in some cases it may be to Judaean disciples only. In John i. 35-37 the disciples of John the Baptist are spoken of, and they transfer their allegiance to Jesus, the names mentioned being Andrew, Simon Peter, Philip, Nathanael ; the unnamed follower (v. 40) was probably the beloved disciple. Probably all these were with Jesus at Cana on the first visit (ii. 2, 11, 12). If, as is probable, iii. 22-30 follows ii. 12, the Galilaean disciples may have left Capernaum with Him, and come to Judaea when He for a time exercised a ministry of repentance like the Baptist's. But when He went up to Jerusalem for the feast (ii. 13) no disciples are mentioned. The disciples referred to in vv. 17, 22 may have been Judaeans, including the beloved disciple. In Judaea a number of disciples had been won, and baptized not by Jesus HimseK, but by His disciples (iv. 2). On the journey through Samaria He is accompanied by disciples, but as no names are mentioned, there is no evidence that any of the Twelve were included (iv. 8, 27, 31, 33) ; but it is likely that the beloved disciple was one, as much of the story reads like that of an eye-witness. Does not v. 45 even suggest that the Galilaeans were with Jesus only at the feasts, although not as disciples in close associa tion ? There is no mention of disciples in the account of the second visit to Cana. It was probably sub sequent to it, when Jesus began His pubfic ministry in Galilee, that the company of Twelve was formed. Till then disciples had come and gone. When the Fourth Gospel deals with the work in Galilee in vi., not only is there frequent mention of the disciples (vv. 3, 8, 12, 16, 22, 24, 60, 61, 66), but some of the THE AUTHORSHIP OF THE GOSPEL 223 Twelve are mentioned by name, e.g. Philip (vv. 5, 7), Andrew (v. 8), Simon Peter (v. 68), Judas (v. 71). Reason has been shown in a previous chapter why this account is not to be assigned to the witness. In the story in v. which should follow vi. no disciples are mentioned. Probably Jesus went up alone, and desired to attract no attention, although His intention was frustrated by the garrulity or treachery of the man He had cured (v. 13). The taunt in vii. 3 refers to Judaean disciples. The disciples mentioned in viii. 31 have just been won to Jesus' cause. The question in ix. 2 was put more probably by Judaean than Galilaean disciples, as it is probable that the blind beggar was a familiar sight to the questioners, and may even have been a subject of dispute among them. If so, the question was not casual, but intended to settle a difference of opinion. There is nothing to determine whether the disciples mentioned in xi. included all the Twelve. Thomas alone is mentioned by name (v. 16). Had Peter been present, would he not have been the spokesman ? Further, had he been present, the silence of Mark regarding the miracle is more difficult to explain. The beloved disciple was probably not with Jesus beyond Jordan, but remained in Jerusalem, and got at second hand the story in xi. 1-16. His presence at Bethany is more probable. That the Twelve as well as other disciples were present in Jerusalem in the week of the Passion is certain ; but that does not prove that they were with Jesus at previous feasts, and the beloved disciple may have been with Him when the Twelve were not. The evidence does not support the assumption that the Twelve were always with Jesus, but rather the con clusion that they were not usually with Him in Jerusalem until the last week, and that there Judaean 224 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE disciples (including the beloved disciple) took their places. This conclusion would afford a satisfactory explanation of the silence of the Synoptics regarding the visits to Jerusalem, and the silence of the Fourth Gospel regarding the public ministry in Galilee. (/3) This conclusion is confirmed by an examination of the references to any of the disciples by name. Simon Peter is mentioned in i. 40, 41, 42, 44, and in vi. 68. He is very frequently mentioned in xiii., xviii., xx., and xxi. He is not once alluded to in the record of the visits to Jerusalem prior to the last. Ready and even hasty as he was for speech and action at all times, is it at all likely that, K he had been present at all, on any of the occasions, there would not have been some reason for referring to him ? This does seem a case in which silence warrants our inferring absence. Of the other apostles Andrew is mentioned in i. 40, 44 ; vi. 8 ; and xii. 22. Philip is associated with him on each of these occasions (i. 43-44, 45, 46, 48 ; vi. 5, 7 ; xii. 21, 22) ; and he is also reported as having asked Jesus to show the Father (xiv. 8-9). Nathanael was a friend of Philip's, and was brought to Jesus by him (i. 45, 49). He is not again mentioned until we reach the Appendix to the Gospel (xxi. 2). Thomas is first mentioned as proposing the return to Judaea if need be to die with Jesus (xi. 16). It is he who confesses his ignorance of Jesus' goal and the way to it (xiv. 5). He is solitary among the Twelve by his absence from the Upper Room when Jesus appeared\ to the disciples, and his disbelief of the testimony of others (xx. 24) ; but on the second ap pearance his unbelief was turned to faith (vv. 26-29). In the Appendix also his name is given (xxi. 2). The Appendix reports names mentioned in the Gospel, and adds ' the sons of Zebedee' (v. 2), regarding whom THE AUTHORSHIP OF THE GOSPEL 225 the Gospel is altogether silent, and ' two other of his disciples.' The reasons for this have already been discussed in dealing with the Appendix. Of Judas Iscariot necessarily frequent mention is made, but always in connexion with the betrayal (vi. 71 ; xii. 4 ; xiii. 2, 26, 30 ; xviii. 2, 5). Another Judas, not Iscariot, is once mentioned as asking a question in the Upper Room (xiv. 22). Neither James of Alphaeus nor Matthew is referred to in this Gospel. The dis tribution of the names in the Gospel offers conclusive evidence that the Twelve were not with Jesus in Jeru salem, except on the last visit. (y) Let us look at the references to the disciple, who is assumed as the eye-witness of what the Fourth "Gospel records, to discover K that necessitates or justifies the identification with John the son of Zebedee. It is an inference, but a legitimate inference, that he was one of the two disciples (Andrew being the other) who left the Baptist for Jesus (i. 37). It is a con jecture that the rest of the Gospel does not offer any ground for, that this unnamed disciple was the son of Zebedee, John, and that he brought his brother James, after Andrew had brought Simon (the word first in v. 41). If he is not to be identified with John the son of Zebedee, although the Appendix leaves open the identification, room is left for him by the mention of the two unnamed disciples (xxi. 2) ; but in view of the character of the Appendix, no stress can be laid on any evidence it offers. He, too, may be identified with the disciple who was known to the high priest, and who secured Peter's admission to the high priest's palace (xviii. 15, 16). At the Last Supper he is described as ' the disciple whom Jesus loved ' (xiii. 23), and so also when the mother of Jesus is entrusted to him (xix. 26) and when he is Peter's p 226 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE companion to the tomb (xx. 2, 4, 8 ; cf. xxi. 7, 20, 23). If he was the master of the house, his position at the Last Supper is explained. Why he was made guardian of Jesus' mother has already been shown. As Peter's host, his being with Peter at the tomb is also explained. The Appendix refers to his position at the Supper (v. 20) and claims that he is the witness for the things recorded (v. 24). Not one of these references represents him as in the position with Peter and James in which John is presented to us in the Synoptics. These three intimates of Jesus were with him when He withdrew from the other disciples in Gethsemane (Matt. xxvi. 37). If the beloved disciple was John, why does the Fourth Gospel pass over that sacred experience ? There is nothing in all these references that shuts us up to the conclusion that the beloved disciple was one of the three intimates, even one of the Twelve, even a companion of Jesus in Galilee. Thus Bishop Westcott's last fink is not only severed ; it does not exist at all. (6) Dr. Sanday uses in favour of the authorship of the Gospel by the son of Zebedee the argument that the Fourth Gospel represents Peter and the beloved disciple as holding the same relation to one another as Peter and John the son of Zebedee in the Book of Acts ; and it is more natural and obvious ' to regard the later relation as the direct continua tion of the earlier ' than to suppose ' two pairs who would be too much the doubles of each other.' This argument demands close examination in detail. His interpretation of xx. 2 is that ' they lodged together in Jerusalem.' 1 But if the beloved disciple was Peter's host, this verse does not bear the significance Dr. Sanday finds in it. The details with which the 1 The Criticism of the Fourth Gospel, pp. 102-107, THE AUTHORSHIP OF THE GOSPEL 227 meetings in the Upper Room on two successive ' first days of the week ' are recorded, as compared with the less definite account in Luke xxiv. 33, suggest that he was on both occasions the host as he had been at the Last Supper (xx. 19-29). That at a later date Peter went to the house of Mary cannot be quoted in disproof, as amid persecution the believers would move from place to place (Acts xii. 12). Dr. Sanday's further statement, that xxi. 20 shows that ' they each take an affectionate interest in the other,' loses its force K the Appendix is a much later addition to the Gospel of much lower credibility. If the beloved disciple was a disciple of John the Baptist's with Andrew, Peter's brother (i. 40), this connexion does not necessarily indicate the close association assumed. On two other occasions, at the Last Supper and at the high priest's palace, is he brought together with Peter, but in the one case the position at the table of each, and in the other the willingness to do a good turn to any follower of Jesus, are an adequate explana tion. The writer at least cannot find any adequate proof of the special friendship Dr. Sanday assumes. In view of the prominence of John the son of Zebedee alongside of Peter in the Synoptics and Acts, it is impossible to understand why the identity is so care fully concealed in the Fourth Gospel. Elsewhere the reason for that concealment has been indicated, if the beloved disciple was what the writer holds him to have been. (c) The writer is, however, in entire accord with Bishop Westcott and Dr. Sanday in insisting that in the Gospel we are dealing with an eye-witness, and it is hoped that throughout this discussion the evidence for this conclusion has been strengthened. He is inclined to insist that the reason for the addition 228 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE or the omission of an incident is not altogether, or even mainly, to be found in the witness's pragmatism ; but, where that is not obvious and needs to be dis covered by strained ingenuity, in his presence or absence from the scene. If we set aside the insertions of the redactor, and the additions of the evangelist, in what remains we may assume that the witness is recording what he saw and heard, and the reflexions which his reminiscences inspired. The view of Dr. E. F. Scott, that ' apart from its allegorical value, the picturesque detail in John's narrative can be set down, not to the accurate memory of the eye-witness, but to the fine instinct of the literary artist,' appears not only intellectually improbable, but even morally offensive, as the witness seems far too serious and sincere to stoop to any devices such as are suggested in the following sentence : ' All the more that the prevailing tenor of his work was abstract and medi tative, he felt the need of relieving it with touches of livelier colour.' 1 What we meet with in the Gospel is reality and not realism. The intensity of religious faith excludes the artifices of literary culture. The writer must confess that he has found not only Dr. Scott's but other books written from the same stand point too ingenious and altogether unconvincing. (d) It seems to be altogether more difficult to maintain the general historical credibility of the Gospel, if we assume that a Galilaean disciple who was Jesus' companion throughout His whole ministry there was so indifferent to and ignorant of the course and characteristics of the ministry, as the witness in the Fourth Gospel shows himseK to be, and that a fisherman of Galilee had a dominating interest in, and an intimate knowledge of, not only the Judaean 1 The Fourth Gospel ; its Purpose and Theology, p. 19. THE AUTHORSHIP OF THE GOSPEL 229 ministry, but of all the local and temporary conditions of it such as the Fourth Gospel displays. To preserve a tradition, the defenders of the authorship by the son of Zebedee weaken the defence of the historical value of the Gospel. All the reasons offered in the previous discussion for regarding the witness as a disciple of Jerusalem are reasons against the traditional authorship, as has been shown at each point. The capacity and character of the witness who in loving intimacy with Jesus could appreciate His higher teaching, as the Twelve could not, do not correspond with the impression of the son of Zebedee which the Synoptics leave upon us. ' Them [John and James] he surnamed Boanerges, which is, sons of thunder ' (Mark iii. 17). It was John who forbade the disciple who did not follow to use His name in exorcisms, and who with his brother desired to call down fire on the inhospitable Samaritan village (Luke ix. 49-56). The two brothers, James and John, with their mother, plotted to get a favoured place in the Kingdom (Matt. xx. 20-28). The beloved disciple was not this manner of man. If it be urged that in a long life he was much changed, so that the fiery zealot became the thoughtful and tender interpreter of the heart of God in Christ, it has to be pointed out that the thought ful and tender intimacy he enjoyed with Jesus was not in his old age, but at the very time with which the Synoptics deal. To have received and remembered what He afterwards recorded he must have been other than the son of Zebedee was. He must have already been as companion what he proved as witness, apprecia tive of and sympathetic with that ' inner IKe ' of Jesus which he has unveiled for us, and for which, as the Synoptic Gospels testify, the company of the Twelve was so unintelligent and insensitive. The questions 230 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE in the Upper Room show how dull these disciples were, and the records before us give no evidence that the son of Zebedee was any way more fit than his comrades. The writer is firmly convinced that no internal evidence can be produced for, and all the internal evidence is opposed to, the authorship of the Fourth Gospel by John the son of Zebedee. It is only an undue deference to the tradition about the authorship, which is by no means convincing on the one hand, and a baseless assumption that only among the Twelve could a disciple be found who could produce such a Gospel on the other hand, that have led so many scholars so persistently to maintain this tradi tional view, despite the difficulties in regard to the historical value of the Gospel which such a view involves. (ii) Can we identify the witness with any of the persons whose names are mentioned in the New Testament ? To this question we must now address ourselves. (a) Dr. Swete 1 has suggested that the beloved disciple may be identified with the rich young ruler. Some support is lent to the identification by two facts, first, that he asked a question concerning eternal life, and second, that Jesus is said to have loved him when He looked upon him (Mark x. 17, 21). For first, the conception of eternal fife dominates the Fourth Gospel, and not that of the Kingdom of God as in the Synoptics ; and second, the witness is described as ' the disciple whom Jesus loved.' If this be his own description, it may be a sorrowful confession ; ' still loved though afraid openly to acknowledge the loving Master.' The objection to the identification is that it is towards the close of the ministry that 1 Journal of Theological Studies, July 1916. THE AUTHORSHIP OF THE GOSPEL 231 the Synoptic record places the coming of the rich young ruler to Jesus, and the Fourth Gospel contains the reminiscences of a disciple from the beginning. The objection, however, is not insuperable. He may have been a companion before the public ministry began. He may, however, have avoided openly identifying himseK with the disciples of Jesus on His visits to Jerusalem. Overcome by his aspiration to find from the lips of Jesus the answer to his question, he may have forgotten his prudence for a moment in this act of homage. Jesus, anxious to bring the waverer to decision in an open confession, may have desired by his severe demand to loose the bonds that bound him. Is Jesus' attitude to him, or his to Jesus, not more intelligible K there were some previous connexion ? Would Jesus have given the call to become one of His followers at so great a cost to a stranger, had He had no ground in previous knowledge for expecting that it would be heard and answered. Although the open confession may have been delayed for years, and the silence of the Synoptists regarding the identity of the rich young ruler may have been due to his own desire to remain a secret disciple ; yet at last, K only in distant Ephesus, and not in Jeru salem itseK, the confession may have been made. May he not include himseK among those to whom reference is made in xii. 42-43, an utterance of con trition ? Was the memory of the ' great refusal ' too painful to be explicitly recorded, and was the con fession made thus indirectly ? This identification must, however, remain only a plausible conjecture. (6) Another conjecture has been put forward by the Rev. B. Grey Griffith, Cardiff1: 'The phrase " The disciple whom Jesus loved " (ov fiydira 6 'Iyo-ov?) 1 The Expository Times, xxxii. p. 379. 232 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE does not occur till we come to the 13th chapter, and then is found several times to the end of the Gospel. Some one has come into the story who carries the title. Either he was not in the story before, or he has received a new name. But a similar phrase is found in chapter 11, "He whom thou lovest is sick " (Kvpte, Z8e ov v et? tov koKitov tov iraTpos ; even such a statement in the next verse, 6? io-Tiv avTov \oyof diro 0-17779 irpoeXOwv has probably connexion with other circles of thought than the Prologue.2 In the preceding discussion John v. 19 has been as signed to the evangefist. The clause in Magnesians 7 can be derived from John viii. 28.3 Bomans 7 has a likeness to John vi. 32, 33, 55. While the narrative framework of vi. has been assigned to the redactor, it has been recognized that he has used sayings that do belong to the witness's report. This same explanation applies to the connexion of Ode xii. 11 with John vi. 33, 37.4 Accordingly if we allow the connexion of the Ignatian Epistles and the Odes with the Fourth Gospel, that connexion may be restricted to the reports of the witness, and we may base on that fact the origin of this part of the Gospel only in Antioch. (g) The evidence does not forbid the assumption that this part of the Gospel was taken by the evangelist to Ephesus, so that the Gospel assumed its present form there as has generally been held. The change of place would throw the witness altogether into the background, and lead first to the ascription of the whole Gospel to the evangelist, and at last, K his name was John, to the identification with John the son of Zebedee, at which an attempt is made in the Appendix. It is for scholars familiar with Aramaic 1 Op. cit. pp. 167-168. » Idem, p. 156. 8 Idem, pp. 155-157. * Idem, p. 168. R 258 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE to test Dr. Burney's hypothesis linguistically. On the side of literary and theological criticism it seems to call for qualification, such as has been indicated. While in many respects it confirms the conclusions of this volume, it does not necessarily contradict any of them. Accordingly the writer has not felt under an obligation to reconsider the question, but sends forth this result of many years' occupation with the problem of the Gospel, with a due sense of its imperfections, in the hope that it will contribute to a firmer assurance regarding the historical as well as the theological and ethical value of the Gospel, as he holds strongly the conviction that Christian faith has its unshaken foundation, not in religious ideas and moral ideals, but in historical facts, in the historical personafity, by whom God is revealed, and man redeemed, the Son who makes the Father known that men may find eternal IKe in Him. INDEX (1) GENERAL Abraham, 246. Allegory, 121. Andrew, 43, 56, 73, 80. Antichrist, 27. Antioch, 256. Apocalyptic, 26. Appendix, xv, xvi, xvii, xxi, 30- 37, 202, 234, 257. Aramaic (Origin), 250-258. Ascension, 185, Atonement, 26. Bacon, xvi, xxi, 36, 39, 55, 59, 66, 154, 219, 238. Baldensperger, 1. Bennett, 27. Bernard, 186. Beyschlag, 126. Blass, 39. Bousset, 205. Box, 245. Bruce, 126, 134, 187. Burkitt, 180, 181, 207. Burney, 6, 240, 250-258. Burton, 110, 111, 179. Chalmebs, 159. Charles, 24. Chastand, 47, 49, 50. Christology, 5, 8, 21, 27, 46, 102, 123, 139, 189, 194-201, 242. Chronology, xv, 60, 61-65, 118, 170, 238, 255. Chrysostom, 68. Colossians, 7. Comments, xxi. 14-29, 87, 93, 202. Controversy, 104, 117, 157, 198. Dale, 249. Death, 58, 123, 128, 195, 199. De Boor, 207. Dedication (Feast), 118-124. Delff, 204. Dionysius, 207. ' Disciple whom Jesus loved,' xvi, xxii, 32, 35, 145, 202-204, 222, 225. Disciples, 44, 130, 221-224. Displacements, 2, 40, 41, 43, 76, 101, 143. Docetism, 178-180, 243. Dods, 2, 13, 16, 108, 178, 179, 189. Drummond, 204, 207, 209, 237. Dualism, 53, 94. Eschatology, 22, 35, 120, 163, 199, 219, 238. Eternal Life, 93, 196, 242. Eucharist, 50, 199. Eusebius, 181, 206, 208, 212, 252. Evangelist (the), xxi, 2, 4, 7, 14-29, 39, 40, 43, 61, 75, 87, 93, 104, 128, 132, 191, 194, 199, 206, 217-219, 234, 242, 250, 251, 257. Excommunication, 119. Experience, 23, 93, 158, 199. Forbes, 128. Foreknowledge, 18. Gakdneh, xviii. Georgius Monachus, 207. Glory (the), 66, 140-193. Griffith, 231. Grubb, 124. 259 260 THE BELOVED DISCIPLE Harnack, 5, 12. Harris, 6, 8, 256. Harvey, 213. Hellenism, 244. Henslow, 156. Historicity, 67, 85, 170. Holdsworth, 67. Holtzmann, 109. Ignatius, 256. Insertions, xvii, 38-60. Irenaeus, xix, 210-217, 252. Jerome, 68, 207. Jews, 47, 107. John (Baptist), 1, 3, 20, 78-80, 84, 195. John (Elder), xvi, xx, 205, 217- 219, 235, 251. John (Epistles), xiii, 3, 26, 220. John (Zebedee), xix, 32, 35, 39, 43,71-72,80,145, 158, 180, 202, 204, 206, 207, 208, 211-217, 227, 251, 257. Josephus, 95. Judaism, 245-248. Judgment (the), 66, 100-139. Jiilicher, 1. Justin, xvii, 220, 247. Kennedy, 211-217. Kenosis, 28. Kingdom (of God), 93. Lazarus, 124-139, 232-234. Lewis, 233. Lightfoot, 127. Logos, 2, 8-11, 14, 16, 128, 201, 251, 253. Loisy, 1. Luke, 68. M'Giffert, 206. MacGillivray, 153. Macgregor, 110, 111. Macintyre, 24. Mark, 68, 87, 173. Matthew, 68. Memra, 253. Messiah, 70, 78, 86, 95, 98, 102, 105, 108, 114, 117, 120, 138, 141, 197, 241. Meyer, 109. Mingana, 256. Miracles, xiv, 57, 83, 88, 129, 193, 198, 240, 243. Moffatt, 30, 35, 40, 41, 47, 103, 114, 119, 122, 128, 129, 143, 153, 154, 156, 170. Moral Therapeutics, 54, 124. Mysteries, 249. Mysticism, 249. Naish, 50. Nestle, 114, 120. Omniscience, 17, 81. Origen, 208. Origin (Aramaic), 250-258. Papias, xvii, 206, 207, 212, 220, 252, 253. Parable, 121. Partition (Theories), xiii-xviii. Passion (the), 140. Passover, 100. Peake 1 . Pentecost, 100-105, 110, 112, 187. Peter, 39-43, 69, 73, 87, 151, 158, 163, 223. Pfleiderer, 1. Pharisees, 89, 107, 113. Philip, 43, 56, 73. Philip (Side), 207. Philo, 3, 8-11, 217. Pliny, 189. Polycarp, xvii, 210, 211, 220. Polycrates, 181, 206, 215. Pothinus, 212. Pre-existence, 11-13, 117, 118, 165, 196. Prologue, xiii, xiv, xvii, xxi, 1-13, 20, 102, 201, 202, 234. Prophecy, 15, 137, 143, 178, 193. Rabbinism, 255. Ramsay (A.), 27. Ramsay (W.), 172. Redactor (the), xv, xvi, xxi, 38-60, 128, 151, 154, 180, 194, 198, 199, 202, 206, 216, 220, 234, 250. Reflexions, xxi, 75, 80, 93, 97, 104, 148, 197. GENERAL INDEX 261 Regeneration, 89. Reminiscences, xxi, 75, 80, 104, 148, 197. Resurrection, 16, 23, 91, 128, 165, 182-193, 199. Rigg, 233. Righteousness (of God), 93. Rishell, 1. Robertson, 208, 209. Romans, 93. Ruler (rich young), 230-233. Sadducees, 89, 181. Salvation, 195, 199. Samaritans, 94. Sanday, 172, 183, 205, 208, 209, 210, 221, 226, 241. Sanhedrin, 107, 118, 170, 175. Scott, xiii, 1, 5, 228. Shekinah (SheHna), 113, 253. Smith, 27. Solomon (Odes), 256-258. Son (of God), 7, 91, 117, 196, 199, 242, 247. Son (of Man), 91. Sophia, 6, 8. Souter, 136. Spirit, 16, 20, 26, 76, 89, 150, 166-169, 196, 200, 236, 250. Spitta, 112, 155. Stanton, xix, 3, 4, 6, 36, 38, 217, 238, 251. Stoicism, 248-249. Strachan, xv, xvii, 22, 34, 35, 51, 55, 56, 57, 79, 83, 86, 89, 96, 104, 118, 127, 148, 179, 183, 185, 187, 190, 191, 192, 236, 238, 244, 250, 254. Strauss, xvii. Stroud, 179. Supernatural, 14, 16, 25, 46, 54, 87, 133, 197. Swete, 230. Symbolism, 51, 83, 87, 97, 159, 179, 193. Tabernacles (Feast), 106-118. Talmud, 109. Targums, 253, 254. Tatian, 59. Testimony (the), 65, 78-99. Thayer, 135. Tholuck, 13. ThomaB, 154, 188, 191. Thompson, xiv, 25, 33, 76, 84, 100, 109, 120, 143, 153. Trance, 124. ' Two Document Theory,' xvii, 67. Waterland, 179. Weiss, 126. Wendt, xiv, 24, 41, 121, 134, 148, 150, 151, 154. Westcott, xiii, 2, 6, 12, 27, 29, 52, 53, 71, 90, 91, 107, 108, 114, 120, 127, 138, 147, 155, 168, 172, 179, 221, 226, 241. Witness (the), xxi, 2, 4, 14, 19, 20, 25, 40, 43, 54, 55, 60, 61, 74, 141, 144, 148, 171, 174, 177, 180, 182, 184, 185, 191, 194, 199, 202, 206, 223, 235, 247, 250, 255, 257. Y'kara, 253. r2 (2) SCRIPTURE REFERENCES Psalm — PAGE Matthew — PAGE xxii. 18 . . 15 xxvi. 6-16 .... 140 xxxiv. 20 . . . 15 37 . 226 xxxv. 19 . . . 15 xxvii. 15-17 . . 176 xii. 9 . . . . 15 19 . 175 lxix. 9 . . . . 15 20-21 . . 176 22 . . . 16 62 . 107 lxxxii. 6 . 17 xxviii. 1-10 . 182, 184 cix. 8 . . . . 15 10 . 189 Isaiah— 20 150, 249 vi. 10 . . . 15 Mark — Iii. 13-liii. 12 1 5, 79, 194 i. 10 . . 79 Zechariah — 14 . . . 56 ix. 9 . . . . 15 12 . . 86 xii. 10. . . 15 12-27 . 98 Matthew — 16-20 . 31, 73 iii. 11 . . . 150 21 . . 74 17 . . . 79 ii. 8 17 iv. 18-22 . . . 31 14 . . 56 vi. 26-32 . . . 102 iii. 16 . 81 viii. 5-13 . . 54 17 . 72, 229 ix, 18-26 . . . 125 21 . . 106 x. 20 150, 166 31-35 106, 248 40 . . . 151 v. 35-43 . 125 xi. 20-24 . . . 104 vi. 3 50 25-27 . . 28, 43, 52 30-44 . 45,49 27-30 . . . 164 53-56 46 xii. 31-32 . . . 105 vii. 1 . 47 xiii. 55 48 3 47 57 . . 55 viii. 1-10 . . 49 xv. 1-21 . . . 43 11 . . 49 xvi. 13-20 . . 41 31-33 . . 42 17 . . 42, 52, 81 34-38 57 19 . . . 187 ix. 1 . 34 xviii. 3 . . . . . 158 17-18 . . 46 xix. 16 . . 93 31 . . . 42 xx. 20-28 . . 72, 229 x. 17 . . 93, 242 xxi. 2-3 . . . . 71 17-21 . 230, 233 2-7 . . . . 141 39 . . . 36 45 . . . . 107 xi. 2-4 . . . 186 xxiii. 1-36 . . . 104 17 . . . 86 37-39 71, 105 xiv. 2 . 73, 170 xxvi. 5 . . . . . 170 3 . . 131 6 . . . . . 131 3-9 . . . 140 262 SCRIPTURE REFERENCES 263 Mark — PAGE John — PAGE xiv. 13-14 ... 71, 186 i. 18 . . . 2, 11,257 32-35 . 57 19-34 . . . . 78 44 . . 173 30 . . . 11 47 . . 170 35-51 . . . 31, 80 51-52 . 173 35 . . . . . 222 XV. 1 171 37 . . . 2, 225 21 . . 170 40 . . 222, 224, 227 25 . . 171 41-42 . . . 69 33 . . 171 41 . . 42, 222, 225 xvi. 1-8 . 182 42-44 . . . 224 7 . . 189 45 . . . . 42 9-20 . 30 46-49 . . . 224 19-20 190 48 . . . . 17 Luke — 49 . . . . 42 iii. 21-22 79 ii. 1-12 . 10, 54, 82 iv. 30 . 173 2 . . . . 222 v. 1-11 31 3 . . . . 74 4-7 . 10 4 . . . 106,248 vi. 14 . 81 11 . . . . 222 vii. 11-17 125 12 xvi, 2 0, 74, 84, 222 44 . 144 13-25 . . xvii, 85 viii. 49-56 125 13-22 . . . 59 ix. 17-18 46 13 . . . 74, 222 49-56 \ 2,229 17 . . 1 5, 86, 98, 222 54 . 146 19 . . . 16, 98 x. 1-20 130 21-22 . . 16, 222 22 . 28 23-25 17, 56, 59, 84, 88 25 . j 3,242 iii. 1-21 . x vii, 59, 84, 88 38 . 131 3-5 . . 52, 93, 94 38-42 71 7 . . . . 98 39 . 149 11-13 . . . 158 xviii. 18 . 93 11-12 . . . 92 xxii. 15-16 171 13-15 . . 11, 43 48 . 173 14, 15 . . . 58, 91 xxiii. 16-21 176 16-21 . . . 20, 92 56 . 170 22-30 . . . 20, 84 xxiv. 1-12 182 31-36 xvi ,20,60,85,200 13-35 184 iv. 1-42 . . . 94-99 33 . 226 1-3 . . xvi 34 . 33, 184 2 . . . . . 222 41-43 . 186 8 . . . . . 222 49 . ! 150, 166, 187 18 . . . . 17, 96 John — 21-23 . . . . 97 i. 1-18 . . . xiv, 2 24 . . . . 97, 169 1 . . 256 27 . . . . . 222 3 . 10 29 . . . . 17, 97 5 . . 256 31 . . . . . 222 6-8 . 2 33 . . . . . 222 9-12 . 256 43-54 . . . . 54 1215 11 43-46 . xvi 14 . 5,256 44 . . . . . 18 264 John- THE BELOVED DISCIPLE page John- 46-54 48 . 54 . . 1-47 1-1617 . 18 . 19-29 19 . 30-47 .. 1-59 1-21 1 2 . 3 . 5 . 6 . 7-8 . 12 . 14 . 15-23 16 . 22 . 24 . 25 . 28-30 29 . 30 . 31 . 32 . 33 . 34-40 37 . 41-42 41 . 41-45 43-46 44 . 47-50 50 . 51-57 52 . 68 . 59 . 60-65 60-61 62 . 63 . 66-71 66 . 26, 44 84, 134 . 44 44, 100 . 101 17, 21, 101 . 17, 246 17, 21, 49, 102, 199, 221, 239 . 257 21,44 43-53 10,45 xvi, 44 xvi, 47 . 222 . 223 xvi, 198 222-224 . 222 47 xvi . 222 47, 222 102, 222 . 46 . 49 . 48 46-48 . 49 49, 257 12, 49, 257 49, 257 . 257 50 46,47 . 48 . 50 . 165 50 12 50, 53, 146 . 47 12 . 46 42 . 222 12, 43, 58 . 146 . 41 . 222 68 . 71 . , 1-14 13-5 . 3 . 6-10 10 . 11 . 12 . 13 . 14 . 15-24 19 . 22-24 25-36 26 . 26-34 30 . 32 . 35-38 35 . 36 . 37 . 37-4438-3943-46 45-52 52 . 53-viii. viii. 12-2012 . 13 . 14, . 15-20 21-59 21-25 26 . 27-29 27 . 28 . 30-33 31 . 33 . 34-4133 . 42-5152-59 58 . 59 . PAGE . . 223 . 223,225 . . 106 xvi, 44 . . 113 . 223,248 . . 113 xvi, 45, 106 . . 107 . 106, 112 . . 107 . . 48 21, 41, 48, 102, 109, 110, 112 . . 106 . 102, 104 . . 110 . . 107 . . 113 . . 59 . 107, 111 . . 113 . . 114 . . Ill . . 108 . . Ill . . 16 . . 106 . 111,206 . . 110 . 109, 112 109, 110, 112 . . 113 . 107, 113 . 12, 110 . . 114 . . 110 . . 114 . . 115 . . 115 . . 16 . . 257 . . 115 . 107, 223 . . 108 . . 115 . . 108 . . 116 . . 117 . 12,118 . . Ill SCRIPTURE REFERENCES 265 John — PAGE John — PAGE ix. 1-41 .... 118 xii. 1 xvi 2 . . . 223 4 . . . . 225 3 . . 120 7 . . ... 159 13-16 . . 245 9-11 xvi 34 . . 118 10 . . . . 206,233 36-41 . 120 12-19 . . . . 141 40-41 . 110 15 . . . . . 15 41 . . 119 17-18 . . . xvi, 142 x. 1-18 119, 121 19 . . ... 142 6-8 . . 121 20-36 43, 44, 56, 142 9 . . 122 21-22 . ... 224 10 . . 122 23 . . . 57, 59, 144 12-18 . 123 24 . . ... 160 19-29 . 119 27 . . ... 173 19-21 IK 1, 119, 120 30 . . . 57, 198 21 . . 110 31-32 . . . . 188 22 . 118, 120 33 . . ... 151 26-28 . 120 35-36 . . . 68 27-29 . 121 30-43 xiv 30 . 119, 123 37-41 . . 15, 142 31-36 . 124 42-43 142, 182, 231 34-36 17 44-50 . . 60, 142 37-39 . 124 xiii. -xvii. . . . 144-169 40-42 xvi xiii. 1-3 . . . 18, 144, 158 xi. 1-57 124-140 2 . ... 225 1-22 . 134 6-11 . . 159, 160 1-16 . 132 12-19 . . 159, 160 2 . xvi 17-20 . . . 151 3 . . 232 18 . ... 15 4 . 132, 248 19 . ... 19 6 . . 232 20 . . . 12, 154 6-10 . 106 21-30 ... 150 6 . . 133 21 . . . 151, 159 9 . . 133 23 . ... 225 15 . . 132 26 . . . 159,225 16 . 1 81, 191 , 223, 224 27 . ... 159 17-19 xvi 28 . . . . 145 21-27 134, 137 30 . . . . 225 21 . . 135 31-38 ... 41 30-31 xvi 31-33 . . 147, 163 32-44 . 137 31 . 57, 134, 153, 155 33 . . 132 33 . . . 154, 176 35 . 132, 134 34-35 147, 151, 154, 38-44 . 183 155, 160 38 . xvi, 132 36-38 xvii, 33, 41, 154 39 . . 135 xiv. 1-11 . . . 163 41 . 19 1 . . . . 41 42 . . 19, 57, 136, 198 5 . 1 54, 188, 191, 224 47-53 1 31, 136, 176, 206 8-9 . . . . 224 51-52 . ... 19 12-15 ... 164 xii. 1-12 . . . 140 16-20 151, 164, 167 Hr-tl00S»0©'I0a»0C0e0C0«-HC0C0THC0C*l>OQ0'*Tl«'^t*C000 rtt>^t^C^T*l|>r^O5COG'^eOG^r^^C»COCO(N(N»-(^j i-l r-t C"arw • * i> co i— r co • ;*; co ™ • jr I— ( ,. ^" i-H ^* W CO >os5 •O0-R« to co os • IN COCO IN tCOOTJ100©tOI>COCOto 00 CO 00 IO OS IN HHIMHH IN Pn I— I o£»I— I fifto rH HPQHMH COto(M . ,ot- . to i> CO CM CO CO '© . . . . 00 1> OS CO . OS .. rH . HHINC1 IN CO TH CO OS IN . H rt IN . . . • TH r—t . . . . "5 IN xix. 1-3 . . Corinthians — iii. 23 .. 1 Tfl Ti* to to 00 ¦* to r-l IN CM IN ©i-i CMCOTHOOrHrHrHi-HlNCMCMCMCOCO -H eq to i> CM IO© © CO T* —l i-. (N IN (N IN 1 TH 00 CO rH i— i IOTf viii. xii. 12 xviii. 24 co to t- © IO I>tN CO < i— < HThTl<»OTtlO-HTr©©-HlNTh©INTPC01OCSIN»OlO©ecq(H(Mt-FHt-.qj i— 1 I— 1 CM i— 1 —1 i— li— IrtrtF 1 i— 1 r1 r-l t— 1- 1— IHH- 1- 1- li— ll— 1 i— 1 r-< I— 1 r-l CM ©I>l>r- cqt-t*t-b-t-p.t*t-t*i>t*CM rH i— I i— I rH i— I i— I i— ( i— I i— I i-h P4 OS ..... ,__, ¦ lOIO • r— 1 r« CO to IO • i— 1 r— IN 00 . IO Td • r— 1 r-l |-I CM • • • OS . to . . i— 1 • • ¦* to © © © Ttl Tfl rH IN COCO «5 IN 00rHINlOI>OSi-H0?e?tO i-HNCMCMINtNCOi-HOSlN . . . . . Til . IO CO . IO IN IN CO T T CO © l> 00 TH U3 CO Hlflt-Hi-IHHNWM XtH . Tft- .© 00 Til t» 00 i-H IN i-l rH CM IN CO o r» •5 i-H CO 10 OSi-h CMri'-HCMTfllOtOOO o W CO O lOOWOOCOHOO^'^r'w O . CO Tf* i— I rH ''"-IN SCRIPTURE REFERENCES 267 1 Corinthians — xv. 50-53 Philippians — ii. 1-11 . . ii. 9 . . . 9-11 . . Colossians — i. 19 . . . AGE 19? 1 John — i. 1 . . PAGE . . . . 178 ii. 7 . . . . . . 147 9 24 165 18 . . iii. 12 . . 22 . . iv. 2 . . . . . 242 .... 242 . . . . 147 . . . . 178 24 v. 6-8 . . . 39, 179, 180 3 9002 05118 3193