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John the Apostle

 
Britannica Concise Encyclopedia: Saint John the Apostle
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(flourished 1st century AD) One of the original Twelve Apostles of Jesus, traditionally credited with writing the fourth Gospel and three New Testament epistles. The book of Revelation was also traditionally assigned to him. His father was a Galilean fisherman. John and his brother James (see St. James) were among the first disciples called by Jesus, and John appears to have held a position of authority in the early church after the resurrection. Later accounts of his life are based on legend. He is said to have died in Ephesus, and his tomb became a site of pilgrimage. John's Gospel, unlike the other three, presents a well-developed theological point of view, on a level with the letters of St. Paul. After a prologue in which he identifies God with the Word (Logos), he offers selected episodes from Jesus' life and ministry. His explications of theological issues such as the significance of the Son of God greatly influenced the development of Christian doctrine.

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Saints: John the Apostle
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John the Apostle (d. late 1st century). He was a son of Zebedee who with his brother James and Peter belonged to the small group of Apostles of Christ, who were privileged witnesses of special events such as the raising of Jairus' daughter and especially the Transfiguration and the Agony in the Garden. James and John were called by the Lord ‘Boanerges’ or ‘sons of thunder’; their ardent temperament was revealed both in their wishing to call down fire from Heaven on the Samaritans who rejected Christ and in their willingness to drink of the cup of suffering as witnesses to the Lord. This was verified in the case of James by his early martyrdom and in that of John by his suffering (according to ecclesiastical tradition) under Domitian's persecution, from which, however, he escaped alive and ended his days at an advanced age at Ephesus.

The tradition that identifies John as the author of the Fourth Gospel goes back to the 2nd century. It is certain, thanks to the discovery of the Chester-Beatty fragment, that this Gospel was in writing in the early 2nd century or earlier. This fragment is far older than that of any extract from the synoptic gospels. Although the Johannine authorship has been much disputed over the last century or more, it is strongly supported by internal as well as external reasons. There seems no compelling reason for rejecting the identification of John with the beloved disciple of the Gospel who was a witness of the events he describes. But he wrote about them in a contemplative way, emphasizing the theological reality and presupposing in his readers a knowledge of Christ's life, portrayed by the synoptic gospels. Above all he clearly stressed the Divinity of Christ, who is both Light and Life, and the importance of Charity (agape) which is the bond between Father and Son and between Christ and his disciples, as well as between the disciples themselves. Traditionally he wrote his Gospel towards the end of his life at the end of the 1st century, including within it inspired meditation on the truths he had witnessed. In this case it would have been written after the First Epistle of John. The Revelation or Apocalypse, however, although also ascribed to him, is so different in thought, style, and content from the genuine Johannine writings that John's personal authorship of it in any normally accepted sense seems unlikely.

After the Resurrection John, who had taken the Blessed Virgin Mary, following Christ's words on the Cross, as his adopted mother, was prominent in the early Church. Not only was he among the earliest witnesses of the Risen Lord, but he also shared in the preaching, organization, and even imprisonment of Peter, towards whom he was subordinate. Later he settled at Ephesus. Various anecdotes are related of him there by Clement of Alexandria and others, such as his recorded fear that the baths at which the heretic Cerinthus was bathing would fall down because he was in them, or again his repeated exhortation to his followers to love one another, which, often repeated, caused them tedium, but which he emphasized because ‘it is the word of the Lord and if you keep it, you do enough’.

Other traditions have had a more direct influence on artistic representations. These include a cup with a viper in it as his emblem, in memory of the challenge to him by a high priest of Diana at Ephesus to drink a poisoned cup. Another symbol is a book, while in evangelist portraits his emblem appropriately is an eagle. One hundred and eighty-one ancient churches and not a few modern ones are dedicated to him. He must have been a very familiar figure to medieval people though being represented on rood-screens, while the iconography of medieval apocalypses often include a series of pictures of his life. He is often represented in the West with John the Baptist, as on the stole of Cuthbert, embroidered at Winchester during the 9th century. A copy of the Gospel of John, written in uncials at Wearmouth–Jarrow in the 7th century and placed in Cuthbert's tomb, is now in the British Library. John is patron of theologians, writers, and all who work at the production of books.

Feast: in the East, 26 September; in the West, 27 December and 6 May, the Dedication of the church of St. John before the Latin Gate, which also commemorates his legendary escape from being plunged into a cauldron of boiling oil under Domitian. But in early times there was some confusion in the date of his feast: in some places it was kept with that of St. James the Less, in others there seems to have been some confusion with St. John the Baptist; but the feast of 27 December is very ancient, appropriately close to Christmas Day. In England both feasts were kept almost universally in the Middle Ages.

Bibliography
Click here for a list of abbreviations used in this bibliography.

  • F. M. Braun, Jean le Théologien et son évangile dans l'Église ancienne (1959), pp. 301–93; F. L. Cross (ed.), Studies in the Fourth Gospel (1957); id., ‘St. John on Patmos’, New Testament Studies, ix (1963), 75–85; recent studies of the fourth Gospel include those by C. H. Dodd (1953 and 1963), C. K. Barrett (1955), M. J. Lagrange (1924), R. H. Lightfoot (ed. C. F. Evans, 1956), E. Malatesta, St. John's Gospel 1920–65; a cumulative and classified bibliography (1967). See also J. Ashton, The Interpretation of John (1986) and Understanding the Fourth Gospel (1991); Raymund Brown, The Community of the Beloved Disciple (1979)
Wikipedia: John the Apostle
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John the Apostle
St. John the Apostle by Hans Memling, c. 1468
(The National Gallery, London)
The Divine, Apostle of Charity, Beloved Apostle
Evangelist
Born c. 0 AD, Galilee, Durham
Died c. 100, Ephesus, Asia Minor[1]
Venerated in All Christianity
Feast December 27 (Western Christianity)
September 26 & May 8 (Eastern Christianity)
Attributes book, a serpent in a chalice, cauldron, eagle
Patronage authors, burns, poisoning, theologians, publishers, booksellers, editors, friendships, and painters

John the Apostle (Greek Ιωάννης) (c. 0 - c. 100) was one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus. He was the son of Zebedee and Salome, and brother of James, another of the Twelve Apostles.

Christian tradition identifies him as the author of several New Testament works: the Gospel of John, the Epistles of John, and the Book of Revelation. Some modern scholars believe that John the Apostle, the author of the Fourth Gospel, and John of Patmos were three separate individuals.[2] For one, the author of Revelation identifies himself as "John" several times, but the author of the Gospel of John never identifies himself by name.

Contents

In the Bible

Saint John the Apostle was the son of Zebedee, and the brother of Saint James the Greater. The Eastern Orthodox tradition gives his mother's name as Salome. They originally were fishermen and fished with their father in the Lake of Genesareth. He was first a disciple of John the Baptist and later one of the twelve apostles of Jesus.

Christian tradition holds that Saint John had a prominent position in the Apostolic body. Saint Peter, St James and St John were the only witnesses of the raising of Jairus' daughter,[Mk. 5:37] of the Transfiguration[Mt. 17:1] and of the Agony in Gethsemane.[Mt 26:37] Only he and Peter were sent into the city to make the preparation for the final Passover meal (the Last Supper).[Lk 22:8] [3] At the meal itself, his place was next to Jesus on whose chest he leaned.[Jn 13:23-25] According to the general interpretation, John was also that "other disciple" who with Peter followed Jesus after the arrest into the palace of the high-priest.[Jn. 18:15] John alone remained near Jesus at the foot of the cross on Calvary with Jesus’ mother, Mary, and the pious women and took Mary into his care as the last legacy of Jesus.[Jn. 19:25-27]

Russian Orthodox icon of the Apostle and Evangelist John the Theologian, 18th century (Iconostasis of Transfiguration Church, Kizhi Monastery, Karelia, Russia).

According to the Bible, after the Resurrection, John and Peter were the first of the disciples to run towards the tomb and John was the first of the apostles to believe that Jesus had truly risen.[John 20:2-10] The author of the Gospel of John was accustomed to identifying himself as "the disciple whom Jesus loved". After Jesus’ Ascension and the descent of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost, John, together with Peter, took a prominent part in the founding and guidance of the church. He is with Peter at the healing of the lame man in the Temple (Acts 3:1 et. seq.). With Peter he is also thrown into prison.[Acts 4:3] He is also with Peter visiting the newly converted in Samaria.[Acts 8:14]

A series of articles on
"John" in the Bible
Johannine literature
Gospel of John · First Epistle of John · Second Epistle of John · Third Epistle of John · Revelation · Authorship
Names
John the Apostle · Disciple whom Jesus loved · John the Presbyter · John the Evangelist · John of Patmos
Communities
Twelve Apostles · The Early Church
Related literature
Apocryphon of John · Acts of John · Logos · Signs Gospel
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There is no positive information in the Bible (or elsewhere) concerning the duration of this activity in Judea. Apparently, John in common with the other Apostles remained some 12 years in this first field of labour, until the persecution of Herod Agrippa I led to the scattering of the Apostles through the various provinces of the Roman Empire. [cf. Ac. 12:1-17] It does not appear improbable that John then went for the first time into Asia Minor . In any case a Christian community was already in existence at Ephesus before Paul's first labours there (cf. "the brethren"),[Acts 18:27] in addition to Priscilla and Aquila. Such a sojourn by John in Asia in this first period was neither long nor uninterrupted. He returned with the other disciples to Jerusalem for the Apostolic Council (about A.D. 51). Paul, in opposing his enemies in Galatia, recalls that John explicitly along with Peter and James the Just were referred to as "pillars of the church" and refers to the recognition that his Apostolic preaching of a gospel free from Jewish Law received from these three, the most prominent men of the Christian community at Jerusalem.[Gal. 2:9] [4]

Of the other New Testament writings, it is only from the three Letters of John and the Book of Revelation that anything further is learned about John. Both the Letters and Revelation presuppose that John belonged to the multitude of personal eyewitnesses of the life and work of Jesus (cf. especially 1 Jn. 1:1-5; 4:14), that he had lived for a long time in Asia Minor, was thoroughly acquainted with the conditions existing in the various Christian communities there, and that he had a position of authority recognized by all Christian communities as leader of this part of the church. Moreover, Revelation says that its author was on the island of Patmos "for the word of God and for the testimony of Jesus", when he was honoured with the vision contained in Revelation.[Rev. 1:9] John, like his Old Testament counterpart Daniel, was kept alive to receive the prophetic vision.

Though most scholars agree in placing the Gospel of John somewhere between AD 65 and 85,[5] John A.T. Robinson proposes an initial edition by 50–55 and then a final edition by 65 due to narrative similarities with Paul.[6]:pp.284,307 Other critical scholars are of the opinion that John was composed in stages (probably two or three).[7]:p.43 The text refers to its author as "the Disciple Jesus loved". It is traditionally believed that John survived his contemporary apostles and lived to an extreme old age, dying at Ephesus in about A.D. 100.[8]

Extrabiblical traditions

Byzantine illumination depicting John dictating to his disciple, Prochorus (c. 1100).

John is traditionally thought to have moved to Ephesus, where he wrote the Gospel and the three epistles and eventually died. One Roman Catholic tradition heolds that the Virgin Mary accompanied him and died there too, while an alternative tradition locates her death in Jerusalem.

According to tradition, John was also banished by Roman authorities to the island of Patmos, where he then wrote the Book of Revelation. According to Tertullian (in The Prescription Against Heretics) John was banished after being plunged into boiling oil in Rome and remaining unharmed.

Members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints believe that John did not die, but that his body was translated so that he could "tarry" until Jesus' Second Coming. They base this belief on three passages: one in the Book of Mormon (3 Nephi 28:4-6), one in the Doctrine and Covenants (Section 7:1-3), and one in the New Testament (St John 21:21-24).

John's traditional tomb is thought to be located at Selçuk, a small town in the vicinity of Ephesus.

When John was aged, he trained Polycarp who later became Bishop of Smyrna and the teacher of Saint Irenaeus of Lyon.

In art, John as the presumed author of the Gospel is often depicted with an eagle, which symbolizes the height he rose to in the first chapter of his gospel. In Orthodox icons, he is often depicted looking up into heaven and dictating his Gospel (or the Book of Revelation) to his disciple, traditionally named Prochorus.

Liturgical commemoration

The traditional tomb of St. John at Ephesus, Turkey.

He is venerated as a saint by most of Christianity. The Roman Catholic Church and the Anglican Communion commemorate him as "John, Apostle and Evangelist" on December 27.

Another feast day, which appeared in the General Roman Calendar until 1960, is that of "St John Before the Latin Gate" on May 6, celebrating a tradition recounted by Jerome that St John was brought to Rome, and was thrown in a vat of boiling oil, from which he was miraculously preserved unharmed. A church (San Giovanni a Porta Latina) dedicated to him was built near the Latin gate of Rome, the traditional scene of this event.[9]

The Eastern Orthodox Church and those Eastern Catholic Churches which follow the Byzantine Rite commemorate the "Repose of the Holy Apostle and Evangelist John the Theologian" on September 26. On May 8 they celebrate the "Feast of the Holy Apostle and Evangelist John the Theologian", on which date Christians used to draw forth from his grave fine ashes which were believed to be effective for healing the sick.

See also: Basilica of St. John

See also

References

  1. ^ St. John the Apostle Catholic Online.
  2. ^ Griggs, C. Wilfred. "John the Beloved" in Ludlow, Daniel H., ed. Selections from the Encyclopedia of Mormonism: Scriptures of the Church (Salt Lake City, Utah: Deseret Book, 1992) p. 379. Griggs favors the "one John" theory but mentions that some modern scholars have hypothesized that there are multiple Johns.
  3. ^ While Luke states that this is the Passover,[Lk 22:7-9] the Gospel of John specifically states that the Passover meal is to be partaken of on Friday[Jn 18:28]
  4. ^ Fonck, Leopold (October 1 1910). "St. John the Evangelist". The Catholic Encyclopedia. http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08492a.htm. Retrieved 2007-10-27. 
  5. ^ Harris, Stephen L., Understanding the Bible. McGraw-Hill, 2006. ISBN 978-0072965483
  6. ^ Robinson, John A.T. (1977). Redating the New Testament. SCM Press. ISBN 978-0334023005. 
  7. ^ Mark Allan Powell. Jesus as a figure in history. Westminster John Knox Press, 1998. ISBN 0664257038 / 978-0664257033
  8. ^ St. John the Apostle Catholic Online
  9. ^ Saint Andrew Daily Missal with Vespers for Sundays and Feasts by Dom. Gaspar LeFebvre, O.S.B., Saint Paul, MN: The E.M. Lohmann Co., 1952, p.1325-1326

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