The Upper Register Blog

In his high priestly prayer for his disciples, just before he went to the cross, Jesus prayed, “O righteous Father, even though the world does not know you, I know you, and these know that you have sent me. I made known to them your name, and I will continue to make it known, that the love with which you have loved me may be in them, and I in them” (John 17:25-26 ESV).

These words are an excellent summary of the mission of Jesus: he came to make known the Father. Jesus reveals the Father to us. He does so not merely in an intellectual way, as if we just needed more facts or information about the Father. Jesus reveals the Fatherly character and heart of God, and he does so in a way that communicates experiential knowledge, not just head knowledge. Knowing God as Father means that the love that eternally existed between the Father and the Son is experienced and enjoyed by us as well, that is, we not only are loved by God the Father, but we feel loved by him.

What an awesome privilege! We know God is almighty and holy. We know God sits enthroned with winged seraphim crying out “holy, holy, holy” day and night before him in the heavenly temple. He is the high and lofty one, clothed in such unapproachable light, that no one has seen God as he is, face-to-face. In view of the seeming distance of God, what an incredible blessing that we should be able to crawl up on the knees of this holy God with the freedom of children and call him Father.

God’s only begotten Son, who is at his side, who is the exact representation of God’s being, has come and has revealed God to be not only his God and his Father, but our God and our Father. “And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us, and we saw His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth” (John 1:14 NASB). “For from the fullness of his grace we have all received one blessing after another” (John 1:16 NIV). And the greatest blessing of all is that we have come to know the Father. For this is eternal life, that we may know the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom he has sent (John 17:3).

We should be both Theocentric and Christocentric. Some Christians are more Theocentric, focusing, for example, on the holiness and majesty of God and the need for awe and reverence of God. I have been in churches like this, where Christ and the cross were hardly mentioned, and the focus was always on “God” in a somewhat authoritarian way. There is a one-sided emphasis that borders on Unitarianism. But other Christians (myself included) tend to be so Christocentric that the Theocentric dimension is often overshadowed. We dwell on the love of Christ, his atoning death, and the forgiveness of sins, but we don’t think as much as we ought about the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. But we should be both Christocentric and Theocentric, albeit in the right order: we should be Christocentric with the aim of coming through Christ to the Father. If I may coin a term, we should be Theo-(through-Christ)-ocentric.

How does the Spirit fit into this? I remember hearing a recording of a sermon by J. I. Packer in which he likened the Spirit’s role to that of a spotlight illuminating a great building at night. The Spirit doesn’t draw attention to himself; his role is to draw our attention to and kindle our affections for Christ.

Some practical ways we can more fully enjoy our relationship with the Father:

(1) We should read the Gospels more, for it is as we see Jesus in his ministry of healing the sick and seeking the lost, and as we respond to this Jesus revealed in the Gospels, that we come to know, experience, enjoy and rest in the love of God as our Father through Christ. As we get to know Jesus better, we get to know God the Father better. Jesus said, “Whoever has seen me has seen the Father” (John 14:9 ESV).

(2) We should venture to make bolder requests in prayer. Our Savior said to his disciples in the upper room, “Truly, truly, I say to you, whatever you ask of the Father in my name, he will give it to you … Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full” (John 16:23-24 ESV). After all, if God is our Father, and if he loves us as fathers love their children, then he will delight to satisfy the holy desires of our heart. “Which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? … If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!” (Matt 7:9-11 ESV).

(3) Those of us who are fathers should think of ways that we can better model the Fatherly love of God to our children, not only for the benefit of our children, but for our own benefit. “As a father shows compassion to his children, so the LORD shows compassion to those who fear him” (Ps 103:13 ESV). The way we discipline our children should mirror the discipline of the heavenly Father (Heb 12:3-11). We should never discipline them in anger, but because we love them and want them to grow in maturity. “The Lord disciplines the one he loves” (Heb 12:6, ESV, quoting Prov 3:12; cp. Rev 3:19).

It is not surprising that the external evidence for Johannine authorship of the Fourth Gospel is casually dismissed by critical scholars. More surprising is the fact that even conservative commentators like Morris, Carson, and Köstenberger don’t actually lay out the external evidence as fully as one would like. So I had to go and collect it myself. Here are the most important testimonies from the church fathers:

AD 170:  Theophilus, Bishop of Antioch, apologist

“Hence the Holy Scriptures and all the inspired writers teach us as one of these, John, says, ‘In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God’” (To Autolycus II.22)

AD 180:  Irenaeus, Bishop of Lyons 

“Matthew also issued a written Gospel among the Hebrews in their own dialect, while Peter and Paul were preaching at Rome, and laying the foundations of the church. After their departure [i.e., death], Mark, the disciple and interpreter of Peter, did also hand down to us in writing what had been preached by Peter.  Luke also, the companion of Paul, recorded in a book the Gospel preached by him. Afterwards, John, the disciple of the Lord, who also leaned upon his breast, did publish a Gospel during his residence at Ephesus in Asia” (Against Heresies III.1)

Although not directly affirming Johannine authorship, the following quote by Irenaeus is important for establishing the credibility of his testimony, given his acquaintance with Polycarp, who himself knew John:

“I have a more vivid recollection of what occurred at that time than of recent events (inasmuch as the experiences of childhood, keeping pace with the growth of the soul, become incorporated with it); so that I can even describe the place where the blessed Polycarp used to sit and discourse – his going out, too, and his coming in – his general mode of life and personal appearance, together with the discourses which he delivered to the people; also how he would speak of his familiar discourse with John, and with the rest of those who had seen the Lord; and how he would call their words to remembrance” (Letter to Florinus, quoted by Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History V.20)

AD 170-200:  The Muratorian Canon

“The fourth book of the Gospels is that of John, one of the disciples. When his fellow disciples and bishops urged him, he said, ‘Fast together with me today for three days and, what shall be revealed to each, let us tell it to each other.’ On the same night it was revealed to Andrew, one of the Apostles, that with all of them reviewing it, John should describe all things in his own name … What marvel, therefore, if John so constantly brings forward particular matters also in his Epistles, saying of himself:  ‘What we have seen with our eyes and have heard with our ears and our hands have handled, these things we have written to you.’ For thus he declares that he was not only an eyewitness and hearer, but also a writer of all the wonderful things of the Lord in order.”

AD 200:  Clement of Alexandria

“Last of all, John, noticing that the physical things had been set forth in the other Gospels, being urged by his companions and inspired by the Spirit, wrote a spiritual Gospel” (fragment quoted by Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History VI.14)

AD 400:  Jerome

“John, the apostle whom Jesus most loved, the son of Zebedee and brother of James … most recently of all the evangelists wrote a Gospel, at the request of the bishops of Asia, against Cerinthus and other heretics and especially against the then growing dogma of the Ebionites, who assert that Christ did not exist before Mary. On this account he was compelled to maintain His divine nativity.” (Lives of Illustrious Men)

“Last is John, the Apostle and Evangelist, whom Jesus loved most, who, reclining on the breast of the Lord, drank the purest streams of teachings and who alone merited to hear from the cross:  ‘Behold, your mother.’ He – when he was in Asia, and at that time the seeds of the heretics, Cerinthus, Ebion, and others, who deny that Christ came in the flesh, whom he himself also calls Antichrists in his epistle and [at whom] the Apostle Paul frequently lashes out, were already shooting up – he was urged by almost all the bishops of Asia at that time and by delegates of many churches to write more profoundly about the divinity of the Savior and, so to speak, to break through to the very Word of God – not so much with boldness as with fortunate haste*, as the Ecclesiastical History relates. When he was urged by the brethren to write, [he is said] to have replied that he would do so, if, when a general fast had been proclaimed, all would pray to God. When it was carried out, saturated with revelation, he burst forth into that heaven-sent prologue:  ‘In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and this Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God.’” (*Fortunate in view of the fact that John died shortly afterwards.) (From Jerome’s preface to his Commentary on Matthew.)

Theodor Zahn writes:  “All tradition which is ancient and in general worthy of notice agrees in representing John as writing after Matthew, Mark, and Luke, at a great age, and during his residence in the province of Asia, or more specifically in Ephesus” (Introduction to the New Testament, 3.179).

Call me a traditionalist, but I agree with Zahn that in the field of New Testament introduction (or NT Einleitung as the Germans call it) we should give the evidence of tradition the benefit of the doubt and only question it in the face of strong evidence to the contrary.

A reader pointed me to Ben Witherington’s well-argued defense of the theory that John was written by Lazarus. At first this may seem crazy, but it is actually a semi-plausible theory. It was first suggested over a century ago and was triggered by noting that at John 11:3 the sisters of Lazarus send word to Jesus saying, ”Lord, the one you love is sick,” which is similar to the language at 13:23 (although the verbs for ”love” are different). This theory has the drawback of going against ecclesiastical tradition, which uniformly attributes the Fourth Gospel to “John” (whether the elder or the apostle), but it has the advantage of making the author of the Gospel of John an eyewitness.

As attractive as this theory may be, I’m not convinced. You should read the entire article by BW3, but this paragraph is the critical one, with emphasis on the sentences in bold:

At John 13.23 we have the by now very familiar reference to a disciple whom Jesus loved (hon agapa this time) as reclining on the bosom of Jesus, by which is meant he is reclining on the same couch as Jesus. The disciple is not named here, and notice that nowhere in John 13 is it said that this meal transpired in Jerusalem. It could just as well have transpired in the nearby town of Bethany and this need not even be an account of the Passover meal. Jn. 13.1 in fact says it was a meal that transpired before the Passover meal.

Contra BW3’s claim, there are very good reasons to think that John 13 is the Johannine parallel to the Synoptic Last Supper. Consider the order of things in the Synoptics, and see how it fits perfectly with John 13-18:

Jesus celebrates the Passover with his disciples in an upper room, during which Jesus predicts that one of the Twelve will betray him (cp. John 13:18-30), and that Peter will deny him three times (cp. John 13:36-38). After the supper, they leave the upper room, cross the Kidron Valley, and go to a garden on the Mount of Olives (cp. John 18:1). Judas comes and betrays Jesus in the garden (cp. John 18:2-3). 

BW3 appeals to the phrase “before the Passover” in John 13:1. But he is reading too much into the phrase. It need not be taken to mean that the entire John 13-17 meal & discourse was prior to the Passover, but that the immediate paragraph describing the foot-washing was prior to the Passover. This is related to the whole debate on whether John views the crucifixion as occurring on the day of the Passover. Many scholars think so, but this violates the Synoptic account which clearly says that the Last Supper (on Thursday evening) was a Passover, so that Jesus would have been crucified on Friday, the day after the Passover. See D. A. Carson’s commentary for more on this, but he does a good job of defending the view that John is in agreement with the Synoptics with regard to chronology. See also Geldenhuys’s outstanding excursus on the date of the crucifixion at the end of his NICNT commentary on Luke. 

So – if John 13 is describing the Last Supper, and since Mark 14:17 makes clear that Jesus celebrated the Last Supper “with the Twelve,” it follows that the disciple who is described as leaning on Jesus’ breast (John 13:23) must be one of the Twelve.

The traditional view that the Gospel of John was written by one of the twelve, namely, John the son of Zebedee, is not widely held any more. At least in the US the majority view today follows the Martyn-Brown theory which attributes the Fourth Gospel to the Johannine community which may have had some historical roots tracing back to a relatively unknown ”beloved disciple” who may or may not have been an eyewitness, but not one of the twelve and certainly not the apostle John.

Even Richard Bauckham in his magisterial Jesus and the Eyewitnesses argues against apostolic authorship, although he does so not because he is convinced of the Martyn-Brown theory but primarily because, based on his reading of the external evidence, he identifies “the beloved disciple” with an “elder” named “John” who lived in Ephesus toward the end of the first century. This gets into the whole debate about whether Papias and Irenaeus viewed this “John the elder” as one of the twelve. Bauckham thinks they didn’t; many other scholars such as Charles Hill disagree. But at least Bauckham thinks John was written by an eyewitness, an unknown disciple of Jesus who was not one of the twelve.

My point is that if even as conservative a scholar as Bauckham is not convinced of apostolic authorship, then that provides an interesting window on the scholarly landscape. In other words, scholars like Leon Morris, Craig Blomberg, and D. A. Carson who are notable evangelical apologists for the apostolic authorship of the Gospel of John, are in the extreme minority and would appear to most mainstream scholars to be little more than fundamentalists. This can be intimidating to those of us who have conservative views of Scripture but who don’t want to be classed with the unthinking “fundies” whose default position is always the most conservative one possible. When I read Carson’s defense in An Introduction to the NT (co-authored with Douglas Moo), I kept wondering “What is at stake here? Why is Carson so intent on defending the seemingly fringe view that this Gospel was authored by John son of Zebedee? Is it just a commitment to tradition? After all, the text itself only claims to have been written by an anonymous eyewitness.” In other words, while Bauckham’s view is not traditional, neither is it to be lightly dismissed as liberal. It is a credible position that could be consistent with a high view of Scripture, particularly since he highlights the notion of eyewitness authorship of the Fourth Gospel.

How excited I was, then, to read that Craig Keener in his massive 2-volume commentary on the Gospel of John defends the seemingly fringe view. Keener is not a fundamentalist with his back against the wall defending the most conservative positions at all costs. For example, he does not think the apostle Matthew wrote that gospel, contra the testimony of Papias. 

I won’t get into all the arguments, but I thought I would quote a bit to give you a taste of his approach to the authorship of the Gospel of John (all quotes from volume one):

The extant historical evidence for the Fourth Gospel’s authorship is hardly certain, but the evidence is more than adequate to question the dogmatism with which many scholars have opposed it. (p. 81)

Conservative circles in biblical studies are more apt to accept early church tradition (external attestation), whereas in some academic circles the mere acceptance of views which can be denigrated as “conservative” brings into question one’s academic integrity.  Because most scholars write academic works for the latter community, scholarly consensus exerts a pressure of tradition no less coercive than its analogues in more conservative church circles. For this commentary I might therefore have preferred to arrive at conclusions more amenable to the scholarly consensus; but after weighing the evidence, I believe that traditional conservative scholars have made a better case for Johannine authorship of the Gospel (at least at some stage in the process) than other scholars have made against it. (pp. 81-82)

… this is where I honestly believe the evidence surveyed below points. (p. 83)

The approach used by Westcott in the nineteenth century, which narrows down evidence for authorship to the Apostle John, is often dismissed as unduly traditional today. Nevertheless, his arguments remain valuable and marshall more significant internal evidence than do any of the competing hypotheses. As Craig Blomberg notes, although Westcott wrote long ago and his position requires nuancing, “No full-scale refutation of Westcott has ever appeared.” Rather, in the nineteenth-century aftermath of historical skepticism’s successes, many scholars abandoned Johannine authorship more on the basis of the shift in outlook than of any appeal to previously overlooked evidence. (p. 89)

Keener’s entire argument (pp. 81-139) is worth reading. But I thought the above quotes were helpful in establishing Keener’s scholarly objectivity and credibility as one who would not really mind going with a less conservative approach but who simply finds the evidence intrinsically compelling. So if D. A. Carson comes off too much as having an axe to grind or simply a knee-jerk defender of evangelical traditionalism, give Keener and Wesctott a shot. Maybe they’ll convince you.

So what are the actual arguments that Keener uses? I can’t get into all the details, but basically Keener relies on Westcott’s process of elimination or, perhaps better, a process of narrowing-down via concentric circles. In other words, on the basis of internal evidence, there are good reasons to conclude that the author of the Gospel of John was:

1. A Jew
2. A Palestinian Jew
3. A Palestinian Jew from Galilee
4. An eyewitness
5. One of the twelve
6. One of the inner circle:  Peter and the two sons of Zebedee
7. John

Focusing on the last three steps in the narrowing down process, this particular quote stands out in my mind as something that I would want to press Bauckham on, since he goes only as far as step four:

The internal evidence also claims that the author was an eyewitness, a claim that should not be lightly dismissed or reinterpreted to suit more ambiguous evidence [so far Bauckham would agree]. Westcott argues further that the eyewitness must have been one of the Twelve, given the scenes to which he was an eyewitness, including the scene parallel to the synoptic Last Supper (Mark 14:17). These scenes and the disciple’s role further narrow him down to the innermost circle of Jesus. The Synoptics list as the three closest disciples to Jesus:  Peter, James, and John. Since Peter is contrasted with the beloved disciple, and James died early in the century (Acts 12:2), this leaves John for the special role of the “disciple whom Jesus loved.” (p. 90)

At the end of the day, while Bauckham’s position is credible and not to be dismissed, I find the traditional view not only convincing but very helpful in approaching the text itself. I just recently read it in Greek but with this new-found commitment to apostolic authorship. It is amazing how certain things leap out at you when read from this point of view. The authority of the Gospel of John is heightened. It is not merely one man’s religious experience of what Christianity means to him. It is the historical eyewitness testimony, not merely of an unnamed disciple, but of one of the twelve, whom Christ himself appointed and sent to be an authoritative witness to his person and work. And since it was the last Gospel written, and written late in the first century (ca. 98-100), it is the testimony of an aged apostle who is now able to reflect theologically, even doctrinally, and from the point of view of the later church, on what he experienced as a very young man. The overall effect is quite amazing and exciting.

So thank you, Craig Keener, for your defense of Johannine authorship. I realize that your arguments are not new, but coming from someone like you, they are all the more impressive.