Maronite Meditation 73
Today we shall begin to examine the evidence around the authorship of the Gospel of St John. It is a huge topic, but we shall take one manageable portion, an argument made by George Beasley-Murray, who wrote the commentary for this Gospel in the “Word Biblical Commentary” series in 1991. From what I can see, the titles in this series form part of what I have called the “Bible studies establishment.”
At p.lxvi Beasley-Murray commences his discussion of the authorship of the Fourth Gospel. He states that: “the most important witness in the early Church as to the authorship of our gospel is Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons in the last quarter of a second century. He wrote: “John, the disciple of the Lord, who leaned on his breast, also published the gospel while living at Ephesus in Asia.” This is found in Irenaeus’ book Against Heresies, volume 3, chapter 1. He continues: “the “disciple” is clearly the apostle John, who is identified with the “beloved disciple” of the gospel. Irenaeus also … [states that] John lived there [in Ephesus] till the time of Trajan.” Volume 3 chapter 3. Trajan was emperor from the year 98 to 117.
Irenaeus was born in Smyrna, in modern-day Turkey, between about 120 and 130. There he heard St Polycarp, the bishop of Smyrna, who had been appointed to that position by St John the Apostle, and died as a martyr in about 155. So Irenaeus would not have been younger than 25 when Polycarp had died, and may have been as old as 35. He therefore had mature knowledge of him, although Beasley-Murray gives the impression that Irenaeus was a boy when he knew him, for he continues: “This testimony is the more significant in view of Irenaeus’ acquaintance with Polycarp, who was martyred in his old age in AD 155. Irenaeus referred to this in a letter to his friend Florinus: he reminded him of their endeavour as boys to gain the approbation of the aged saint, and in this connection spoke of his memory of those days: “I am able to describe the very place in which the blessed Polycarp sat as he discoursed, and his goings out and his comings in, and the manner of his life, and his physical appearance, and his discourses to the people, and the accounts which he gave of his intercourse with John and with others who had seen the Lord.” (in Eusebius 5.4-8)
Beasley-Murray continues “This testimony is the more significant in view of Irenaeus’ acquaintance with Polycarp, who was martyred in his old age in AD 155. Irenaeus referred to this in a letter to his friend Florinus: he reminded him of their endeavour as boys to gain the approbation of the aged saint, and in this connection spoke of his memory of those days: “I am able to describe the very place in which the blessed Polycarp sat as he discoursed, and his goings out and his comings in, and the manner of his life, and his physical appearance, and his discourses to the people, and the accounts which he gave of his intercourse with John and with others who had seen the Lord.” (in Eusebius 5.4-8)
Beasley-Murray also notes that Polycrates, bishop of Ephesus, wrote to Pope Victor I around the year 190 that among the “great lights” buried in Asia, awaiting the resurrection were Philip, one of the apostles and his three daughters, and “John, who was both a witness and a teacher, who reclined upon the bosom of the Lord, and being a priest wore the sacral plate; he sleeps at Ephesus.” (Eusebius 3.31.3)
He then observes that Clement of Alexandria said “John, perceiving that the bodily facts had been made plain in the gospel, being urged by his friends, and inspired by the Spirit, composed a spiritual gospel” (Eusebius 4.14.7) “He also reported that the apostle John went to Ephesus after Domitian’s death, and went about the surrounding country appointing bishops and consolidating the churches.” (Who is the Rich Man? 42:1f)
Beasley-Murray also quotes the Muratorian Canon and an early introduction to the Gospel of St Luke, known as the Anti-Marcionite Prologue for John’s authorship of the Fourth Gospel. He also makes reference to a passage in Eusebius citing Papias, who wrote: “If ever anyone came who had followed the presbyters, I enquired into the words of the presbyters, what Andrew or Peter or Philip or Thomas or James or John or Matthew, or any other of the Lord’s disciplines had said, and what Aristion and the presbyter John, the Lord’s disciple, were saying.” (Eusebius 3.93.3-4) Note that men whom we would call apostles are here referred to as presbyters. In these early centuries, terminology was fluid. This will become significant later in this series.
Beasley-Murray turns to his critique: “While this testimony in the churches to the authorship of the Fourth Gospel by the apostle John appears impressive, it becomes evident on examination that it is marked by unwarranted elaborations and confusion concerning those of whom it speaks.” He notes that the Muratorian Canon calls Papias “the dear disciple of John,” and that in volume 5 (33.4) Irenaeus calls Papias “a hearer of John and a companion of Polycarp.” But this, he asserts, is a misunderstanding, for Eusebius states that Papias relied on presbyters for his information about the teaching of the apostles, and that it was the presbyter John who was a contemporary of Papias. Then he adds, the Muratorian Canon confuses Philip the apostle with Philip the Evangelist, and includes a legend about St John conferring with other apostles.
He adds: “the notion voiced by Clement of Alexandria that John the apostle went to Ephesus from Patmos after Domitian’s death and pursued an active ministry in the surrounding area is elaborated in the anti-Marcionite prologue by the assertion that the apostle wrote the Apocalypse on Patmos and then wrote the gospel in Ephesus. The Apostle would have been nearly a hundred years old when he exercised this ministry of preaching and writing. Such a ministry is comprehensible of John the prophet who wrote the book of Revelation on Patmos but hardly of the apostle of that name.”
He concludes: “All this combines to make the testimony of Irenaeus concerning the traditions about the fourth evangelist very uncertain.” (lxviii). He does not doubt his memories of Polycarp except to question whether when a boy Irenaeus understood the old man’s references to John. Referring to Eusebius’ quotation from Papias about his enquiries, Beasley-Murray concludes that the presbyter John, a disciple of the Lord, could been confused with the apostle of the same name.
Now, although he makes some more arguments concerning the authorship of St John’s Gospel, before concluding that the author was not St John the apostle, we shall examine his attempts to undermine the second century testimony that the gospel was written by the apostle John and that he was the beloved disciple.
First of all, let us note that nowhere does he tackle the statement of Polycrates bishop of Ephesus, writing to Pope Victor I, in about the year 190. Further, his only critique of Clement of Alexandria, who is thought to have been born between 140 and 150, and died by 220, is based on St John’s age, and is, besides, entirely arbitrary. Domitian reigned between 81 and 96. What is Beasley-Murray’s basis for his confident assertion that St John would have been one hundred years old at this time? If he was twenty years old in the year 33, he would have been 68 when Domitian became emperor. Why is that not “comprehensible” to use his own words? The evidence of the prodigiously learned Clement is especially impressive as it matches exactly what we see in the Gospels: three which deal with the facts of the Lord’s ministry, and John’s Gospel, subsequent to the Synoptics, which fills in the spiritual heights and depths. If we had only the testimony of Clement, we would still have good external evidence for saying that St John the Apostle both wrote the Fourth Gospel and was the beloved disciple mentioned in it. But it is supported by that of Polycrates who represents the local traditions in Ephesus. Their evidence seems conclusive, and, I repeat, Beasley-Murray does not address it when he turns a sceptical eye on Irenaeus.
He doubts Irenaeus’ description of Papias as “a hearer of John and a companion of Polycarp,” asserting that Eusebius had said that Papias knew the presbyter John, not the apostle. But the problems with this are serious: first, to read Beasley-Murray, one would assume that in Book 5, Irenaeus has specified that Papias had heard John the Apostle; otherwise, why raise it? But I have checked Irenaeus, and he does not say “John the Apostle” but only “John.” Having just criticised those who confuse Johns, he now does the same thing. It is perfectly open on the evidence to read Irenaeus as referring to the presbyter of that name who was not an Apostle.
Then, with all due respect to Eusebius, who was relying on Papias’ text, what Papias in fact wrote was not that he had never known the Apostle John, but that he had never asked him what the Lord had said. As J.B. Lightfoot saw in the 19th century, there is nothing in Papias’ text which would rule out Irenaeus’ statement that Papias had been a hearer of St John but a companion of Polycarp., and that Irenaeus had sources which Eusebius did not, having spoken with Polycarp. So instead of critiquing Eusebius, who is plainly suspect on this point, Beasley-Murray takes Eusebius’ conclusion as firm, and refuses to accept Irenaeus.
Third, even if Irenaeus had been confused on the “which-John” question, as was Beasley-Murray himself, that hardly undermines everything he said, especially given that his prime source for the Apostle was St Polycarp, St John’s younger contemporary. Fourth, even if making one small error was grounds for doubt, it would not establish that Irenaeus was wrong: at most it would be cause to exercise caution. We shall see much more of this as we examine the methods of the Bible studies establishment. When it suits their narrative, any grain of doubt is taken as grounds for dismissing the inconvenient evidence.
Beasley-Murray also produces the illusion of battling away errors by, for example, critiquing the Anti-Marcionite Prologue and the Muratorian Canon; but our evidence for the identity of St John the Apostle with the Beloved Disciple and the evangelist of the Fourth Gospel does not rest on these: it rests on Clement, Polycrates, and Irenaeus. Besides, once more, the fact of some pious embellishments in miscellaneous documents is no argument, it is at most a consideration warning us to be careful with the sources.
In the next programme we turn to Beasley-Murray’s arguments from the internal evidence of the Gospel. However, I think that enough has already been seen to show that the Bible studies establishment too often looks for a certain form of argument, and that providing this is set out, the editors of books such as Beasley-Murray’s (and their proof-readers) do not check the source materials to ensure that the author has not been misquoted, in the way that it seems to me Beaslye-Murray misquoted Irenaeus.