John

THE GOSPEL ACCORDING TO

[1] [2]

[3] [4]

[5] [6]

[7] [8]

[21]

INTRODUCTION

THE author of the Fourth Gospel was the younger of the two sons of

Zebedee, a fisherman on the Sea of Galilee, who resided at Bethsaida,

where were born Peter and Andrew his brother, and Philip also. His

mother's name was Salome, who, though not without her imperfections

(Mt 20:20-28),

was one of those dear and honored women who accompanied the Lord on one

of His preaching circuits through Galilee, ministering to His bodily

wants; who followed Him to the cross, and bought sweet spices to anoint

Him after His burial, but, on bringing them to the grave, on the

morning of the First Day of the week, found their loving services

gloriously superseded by His resurrection ere they arrived. His

father, Zebedee, appears to have been in good circumstances, owning a

vessel of his own and having hired servants

(Mr 1:20).

Our Evangelist, whose occupation was that of a fisherman with his

father, was beyond doubt a disciple of the Baptist, and one of the two

who had the first interview with Jesus. He was called while engaged at

his secular occupation

(Mt 4:21, 22),

and again on a memorable occasion

(Lu 5:1-11),

and finally chosen as one of the Twelve Apostles

(Mt 10:2).

He was the youngest of the Twelve--the "Benjamin," as DA COSTA calls him--and he and James

his brother were named in the native tongue by Him who knew the heart,

"Boanerges," which the Evangelist Mark

(Mr 3:17)

explains to mean "Sons of thunder"; no doubt from their natural

vehemence of character. They and Peter constituted that

select triumvirate of whom see on

Lu 9:28.

But the highest honor bestowed on this disciple was his being admitted

to the bosom place with his Lord at the table, as "the disciple whom

Jesus loved"

(Joh 13:23; 20:2; 21:7, 20:24),

and to have committed to him by the dying Redeemer the care of His

mother

(Joh 19:26, 27).

There can be no reasonable doubt that this distinction was due to a

sympathy with His own spirit and mind on the part of John which the

all-penetrating Eye of their common Master beheld in none of the rest;

and although this was probably never seen either in his life or in his

ministry by his fellow apostles, it is brought out wonderfully in his

writings, which, in Christ-like spirituality, heavenliness, and love,

surpass, we may freely say, all the other inspired writings.

After the effusion of the Spirit on the day of Pentecost, we find

him in constant but silent company with Peter, the great spokesman and

actor in the infant Church until the accession of Paul. While his love

to the Lord Jesus drew him spontaneously to the side of His eminent

servant, and his chastened vehemence made him ready to stand

courageously by him, and suffer with him, in all that his testimony to

Jesus might cost him, his modest humility, as the youngest of all the

apostles, made him an admiring listener and faithful supporter of his

brother apostle rather than a speaker or separate actor. Ecclesiastical

history is uniform in testifying that John went to Asia Minor; but it

is next to certain that this could not have been till after the death

both of Peter and Paul; that he resided at Ephesus, whence, as from a

center, he superintended the churches of that region, paying them

occasional visits; and that he long survived the other apostles.

Whether the mother of Jesus died before this, or went with John to

Ephesus, where she died and was buried, is not agreed. One or two

anecdotes of his later days have been handed down by tradition, one at

least bearing marks of reasonable probability. But it is not necessary

to give them here. In the reign of Domitian (A.D. 81-96) he was

banished to "the isle that is called Patmos" (a small rocky and then

almost uninhabited island in the Ægean Sea), "for the word of God and

for the testimony of Jesus Christ"

(Re 1:9).

IRENÆUS and

EUSEBIUS

say that this took place about the end of Domitian's reign. That he was

thrown into a cauldron of boiling oil, and miraculously delivered, is

one of those legends which, though reported by TERTULLIAN and

JEROME,

is entitled to no credit. His return from exile took place during the

brief but tolerant reign of Nerva; he died at Ephesus in the reign of

Trajan [EUSEBIUS,

Ecclesiastical History, 3.23], at an age above

ninety, according to some; according to others, one hundred; and even

one hundred twenty, according to others still. The intermediate number

is generally regarded as probably the nearest to the truth.

As to the date of this Gospel, the arguments for its having been

composed before the destruction of Jerusalem (though relied on by some

superior critics) are of the slenderest nature; such as the expression

in

Joh 5:2,

"there is at Jerusalem, by the sheep-gate, a pool," &c.; there

being no allusion to Peter's martyrdom as having occurred according to

the prediction in

Joh 21:18

--a thing too well known to require mention. That it was composed long

after the destruction of Jerusalem, and after the decease of all the

other apostles, is next to certain, though the precise time cannot be

determined. Probably it was before his banishment, however; and if we

date it between the years 90 and 94, we shall probably be close to the

truth.

As to the readers for whom it was more immediately designed, that

they were Gentiles we might naturally presume from the lateness of the

date; but the multitude of explanations of things familiar to every Jew

puts this beyond all question.

No doubt was ever thrown upon the genuineness and authenticity of

this Gospel till about the close of the eighteenth century; nor were

these embodied in any formal attack upon it till BRETSCHNEIDER,

in 1820, issued his famous treatise [Probabilia], the conclusions of

which he afterwards was candid enough to admit had been satisfactorily

disproved. To advert to these would be as painful as unnecessary;

consisting as they mostly do of assertions regarding the Discourses of

our Lord recorded in this Gospel which are revolting to every spiritual

mind. The Tubingen school did their best, on their peculiar mode of

reasoning, to galvanize into fresh life this theory of the

post-Joannean date of the Fourth Gospel; and some Unitarian critics

still cling to it. But to use the striking language of VAN

OOSTERZEE

regarding similar speculations on the Third Gospel, "Behold, the feet

of them that shall carry it out dead are already at the door"

(Ac 5:9).

Is there one mind of the least elevation of spiritual discernment that

does not see in this Gospel marks of historical truth and a surpassing

glory such as none of the other Gospels possess, brightly as they too

attest their own verity; and who will not be ready to say that if not

historically true, and true just as it stands, it never could

have been by mortal man composed or conceived?

Of the peculiarities of this Gospel, we note here only two. The one

is its reflective character. While the others are purely

narrative, the Fourth Evangelist, "pauses, as it were, at every

turn," as DA COSTA says

[Four Witnesses, p. 234], "at one time to

give a reason, at another to fix the attention, to deduce consequences,

or make applications, or to give utterance to the language of praise."

See

Joh

2:20, 21, 23-25; 4:1, 2; 7:37-39; 11:12, 13, 49-52; 21:18, 19, 22, 23.

The other peculiarity of this Gospel is its supplementary

character. By this, in the present instance, we mean something more

than the studiousness with which he omits many most important

particulars in our Lord's history, for no conceivable reason but that

they were already familiar as household words to all his readers,

through the three preceding Gospels, and his substituting in place of

these an immense quantity of the richest matter not found in the other

Gospels. We refer here more particularly to the nature of the

additions which distinguish this Gospel; particularly the notices of

the different Passovers which occurred during our Lord's public

ministry, and the record of His teaching at Jerusalem, without which it

is not too much to say that we could have had but a most imperfect

conception either of the duration of His ministry or of the plan of it.

But another feature of these additions is quite as noticeable and not

less important. "We find," to use again the words of DA COSTA [Four Witnesses, pp.

238, 239], slightly abridged, "only six of our Lord's miracles recorded

in this Gospel, but these are all of the most remarkable kind, and

surpass the rest in depth, specialty of application, and fulness of

meaning. Of these six we find only one in the other three Gospels--the

multiplication of the loaves. That miracle chiefly, it would seem, on

account of the important instructions of which it furnished the

occasion

(Joh 6:1-71),

is here recorded anew. The five other tokens of divine power are

distinguished from among the many recorded in the three other Gospels

the ordinary laws and course of nature. Thus we find recorded here the

first of all the miracles that Jesus wrought--the changing of water

into wine

(Joh 2:1-11),

the cure of the nobleman's son at a distance

(Joh 4:43-54);

of the numerous cures of the lame and the paralytic by the word of

Jesus, only one--of the man impotent for thirty and eight years

(Joh 5:1-9);

of the many cures of the blind, one only--of the man born blind

(Joh 9:1-12);

the restoration of Lazarus, not from a deathbed, like Jairus' daughter,

nor from a bier, like the widow of Nain's son, but from the

grave, and after lying there four days, and there sinking into

corruption

(Joh 11:1-44);

and lastly, after His resurrection, the miraculous draught of fishes on

the Sea of Tiberias

(Joh 21:5-11).

But these are all recorded chiefly to give occasion for the record of

those astonishing discourses and conversations, alike with friends and

with foes, with His disciples and with the multitude which they drew

forth."

Other illustrations of the peculiarities of this Gospel will occur,

and other points connected with it be adverted to, in the course of the

Commentary.