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In this context, the reference is to John, son of Zeberdee. Tradition credits him with having written five books: the Gospel of John, the three epistles that now bear his name (1 John, 2 John, 3 John) and the Book of Revelation.

However:

  • the fourth gospel was originally anonymous and was only attributed to John quite late in the second century. As modern scholars say that the Gospel could not have been written by an eyewitness to the events described, the attribution to John is unlikely to be historically true;
  • The three epistles were all written by the same person, who calls himself the presbyter (or, in some translations, the 'elder'). It is inconceivable that the apostle John would have referred to himself in this way, and hard to imagine that he would never mention his association with Jesus, if only to have his message more readily accepted. The presbyter who wrote the epistles wascertainly not the apostle John.
  • The Book of Revelation is signed by a person called John, but the book's theology is entirely different to that in the gospels. The early Church Fathers debated who Revelation's John was, and only kept the Book of Revelation for fear that they mightotherwise abandon a book associated with an apostle. Theologians generally agree that this book was written in the last decade of the first century, making authorship by the apostle John most unlikely.
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