John the Evangelist
Of Galilean origin
was in his early days a disciple of
John the Baptist, as were Andrew
and Philip. With them he joined Jesus' followers and he
was always specially attached to the Master.
St. John Mark bishop of
Byblos in Phoenicia {Lebanon}
According to the pre1970 Roman Martyrology, he was described as
the bishop of Byblos in Phoenicia, modem Lebanon. He was perhaps
mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles. Modem scholars are of the view
that he should be identified with St. Mark the Evangelist.
In the Acts he, Peter and James are described as “pillars of the
Church”. According to an old tradition, when he left Jerusalem he
preached Christianity in Asia Minor and became head of the church in
Ephesus.
Exiled to Patmos, he there wrote the Apocalypse (see p. 391).
He also wrote the fourth Gospel and three Letters (see p. 381).
He died at a great age at Ephesus probably in 104 A.D.
St. John the Evangelist
I. New Testament Accounts
II. The Alleged Presbyter John
III. The Later Accounts of John
IV. Feasts of St. John
V. St. John in Christian Art
I. NEW TESTAMENT ACCOUNTS
John was the son of Zebedee and Salome, and the brother of James the
Greater. In the Gospels the two brothers are often called after their
father "the sons of Zebedee" and received from Christ the honourable
title of Boanerges, i.e. "sons of thunder" (Mark, iii, 17). Originally
they were fishermen and fished with their father in the Lake of
Genesareth. According to the usual and entirely probable explanation
they became, however, for a time disciples of John the Baptist, and
were called by Christ from the circle of John's followers, together
with Peter and Andrew, to become His disciples (John, i, 35-42). The
first disciples returned with their new Master from the Jordan to
Galilee and apparently both John and the others remained for some time
with Jesus (cf. John ii, 12, 22; iv, 2, 8, 27 sqq.). Yet after the
second return from Judea, John and his companions went back again to
their trade of fishing until he and they were called by Christ to
definitive discipleship (Matt., iv 18-22; Mark, i, 16-20). In the lists
of the Apostles John has the second place (Acts, i, 13), the third
(Mark, iii, 17), and the fourth (Matt., x, 3; Luke, vi, 14), yet always
after James with the exception of a few passages (Luke, viii, 51; ix,
28 in the Greek text; Acts, i, 13).
From James being thus placed first, the conclusion is drawn that John
was the younger of the two brothers. In any case John had a prominent
position in the Apostolic body. Peter, James, and he were the only
witnesses of the raising of Jairus's daughter (Mark, v, 37), of the
Transfiguration (Matt., xvii, 1), and of the Agony in Gethsemani
(Matt., xxvi, 37). Only he and Peter were sent into the city to make
the preparation for the Last Supper (Luke, xxii, 8). At the Supper
itself his place was next to Christ on Whose breast he leaned (John,
xiii, 23, 25). According to the general interpretation John was also
that "other disciple" who with Peter followed Christ after the arrest
into the palace of the high-priest (John, xviii, 15).
John alone remained near his beloved Master at the foot of the Cross on
Calvary with the Mother of Jesus and the pious women, and took the
desolate Mother into his care as the last legacy of Christ (John, xix,
25-27). After the Resurrection John with Peter was the first of the
disciples to hasten to the grave and he was the first to believe that
Christ had truly risen (John, xx, 2-10).
When later Christ appeared at the Lake of Genesareth John was also the
first of the seven disciples present who recognized his Master standing
on the shore (John, xxi, 7).
The Fourth Evangelist has shown us most clearly how close the
relationship was in which he always stood to his Lord and Master by the
title with which he is accustomed to indicate himself without giving
his name: "the disciple whom Jesus loved". After Christ's Ascension and
the Descent of the Holy Spirit, John took, together with Peter, a
prominent part in the founding and guidance of the Church. We see him
in the company of Peter at the healing of the lame man in the Temple
(Acts, iii, 1 sqq.). With Peter he is also thrown into prison (Acts,
iv, 3). Again, we find him with the prince of the Apostles visiting the
newly converted in Samaria (Acts, viii, 14).
We have no positive information
concerning the duration of this activity in Palestine. Apparently John
in common with the other Apostles remained some twelve 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. Acts, xii, 1-17).
Notwithstanding the opinion to the contrary of many writers, it does
not appear improbable that John then went for the first time to Asia
Minor and exercised his Apostolic office in various provinces there.
In any case a Christian community was already in existence at Ephesus
before Paul's first labours there (cf. "the brethren", Acts, xviii, 27,
in addition to Priscilla and Aquila), and it is easy to connect a
sojourn of John in these provinces with the fact that the Holy Ghost
did not permit the Apostle Paul on his second missionary journey to
proclaim the Gospel in Asia, Mysia, and Bithynia (Acts, xvi, 6 sq.).
There is just as little against such an acceptation in the later
account in Acts of St. Paul's third missionary journey. But in any case
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).
St. Paul in opposing his enemies in Galatia names John explicitly along
with Peter and James the Less as a "pillar of the Church", and refers
to the recognition which his Apostolic preaching of a Gospel free from
the law received from these three, the most prominent men of the old
Mother-Church at Jerusalem (Gal., ii, 9).
When Paul came again to Jerusalem after the second and after the third
journey (Acts, xviii, 22; xxi, 17 sq.) he seems no longer to have met
John there. Some wish to draw the conclusion from this that John left
Palestine between the years 52 and 55.
Of the other New-Testament writings, it is only from the three
Epistles of John and the Apocalypse that anything further is learned
concerning the person of the Apostle. We may be permitted here to take
as proven the unity of the author of these three writings handed down
under the name of John and his identity with the Evangelist. Both the
Epistles and the Apocalypse, however, presuppose that their author John
belonged to the multitude of personal eyewitnesses of the life and work
of Christ (cf. especially I John, i, 1-5; iv, 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, the
Apocalypse tells us 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 heavenly Revelation contained in the Apocalypse (Apoc., i, 9).
II. THE ALLEGED PRESBYTER
JOHN
The author of the Second and Third Epistles of
John designates himself in the superscription of each by the name (ho
presbyteros), "the ancient", "the old". Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis,
also uses the same name to designate the "Presbyter John" as in
addition to Aristion, his particular authority, directly after he has
named the presbyters Andrew, Peter, Philip, Thomas, James, John, and
Matthew (in Eusebius, "Hist. eccl.", III, xxxix, 4).
Eusebius was the first to draw, on account of these words of
Papias, the distinction between a Presbyter John and the Apostle John,
and this distinction was also spread in Western Europe by St. Jerome on
the authority of Eusebius. The opinion of Eusebius has been frequently
revived by modern writers, chiefly to support the denial of the
Apostolic origin of the Fourth Gospel.
The distinction, however, has no historical basis.
First, the testimony of Eusebius in this matter is not worthy of
belief. He contradicts himself, as in his "Chronicle" he expressly
calls the Apostle John the teacher of Papias ("ad annum Abrah 2114"),
as does Jerome also in Ep. lxxv, "Ad Theodoram", iii, and in "De viris
illustribus", xviii.
Eusebius was also influenced by his erroneous doctrinal
opinions as he denied the Apostolic origin of the Apocalypse and
ascribed this writing to an author differing from St. John but of the
same name.
St. Irenaeus also positively designates the Apostle
and Evangelist John as the teacher of Papias, and neither he nor any
other writer before Eusebius had any idea of a second John in Asia
(Adv. haer., V, xxxiii, 4). In what Papias himself says the connection
plainly shows that in this passage by the word presbyters only Apostles
can be understood. If John is mentioned twice the explanation lies in
the peculiar relationship in which Papias stood to this, his most
eminent teacher. By inquiring of others he had learned some things
indirectly from John, just as he had from the other Apostles referred
to. In addition he had received information concerning the teachings
and acts of Jesus directly, without the intervention of others, from
the still living "Presbyter John", as he also had from Aristion. Thus
the teaching of Papias casts absolutely no doubt upon what the
New-Testament writings presuppose and expressly mention concerning the
residence of the Evangelist John in Asia.
III. THE LATER ACCOUNTS OF
JOHN
Christian writers of the second and third centuries
testify to us as a tradition universally recognized and doubted by no
one that the Apostle and Evangelist John lived in Asia Minor in the
last decades of the first century and from Ephesus had guided the
Churches of that province.
In his "Dialogue with Tryphon" (Chapter 81) St. Justin Martyr
refers to "John, one of the Apostles of Christ" as a witness who had
lived "with us", that is, at Ephesus. St. Irenæus speaks in very
many places of the Apostle John and his residence in Asia and expressly
declares that he wrote his Gospel at Ephesus (Adv. haer., III, i, 1),
and that he had lived there until the reign of Trajan (loc. cit., II,
xxii, 5). With Eusebius (Hist. eccl., III, xiii, 1) and others we are
obliged to place the Apostle's banishment to Patmos in the reign of the
Emperor Domitian (81-96). Previous to this, according to Tertullian's
testimony (De praescript., xxxvi), John had been thrown into a cauldron
of boiling oil before the Porta Latina at Rome without suffering injury.
After Domitian's death the Apostle returned to Ephesus
during the reign of Trajan, and at Ephesus he died about A.D. 100 at a
great age.
Tradition reports many beautiful traits of the last
years of his life: that he refused to remain under the same roof with
Cerinthus (Irenaeus "Ad. haer.", III, iii, 4);
his touching anxiety about a youth who had become a robber
(Clemens Alex., "Quis dives salvetur", xiii);
his constantly repeated words of exhortation at the end of his life,
"Little children, love one another" (Jerome, "Comm. in ep. ad. Gal.",
vi, 10).
On the other hand the stories told in the apocryphal Acts of John,
which appeared as early as the second century, are unhistorical
invention.
IV. FEASTS OF ST. JOHN
St. John is commemorated on 27 December, which he
originally shared with St. James the Greater. At Rome the feast was
reserved to St. John alone at an early date, though both names are
found in the Carthage Calendar, the Hieronymian Martyrology, and the
Gallican liturgical books. The "departure" or "assumption" of the
Apostle is noted in the Menology of Constantinople and the Calendar of
Naples (26 September), which seems to have been regarded as the date of
his death. The feast of St. John before the Latin Gate, supposed to
commemorate the dedication of the church near the Porta Latina, is
first mentioned in the Sacramentary of Adrian I (772-95).
V. ST. JOHN IN CHRISTIAN ART
Early Christian art usually represents
St. John with an eagle, symbolizing the heights to which he rises in
the first chapter of his Gospel.
The chalice as symbolic of St. John, which, according to
some authorities, was not adopted until the thirteenth century, is
sometimes interpreted with reference to the Last Supper, again as
connected with the legend according to which St. John was handed a cup
of poisoned wine, from which, at his blessing, the poison rose in the
shape of a serpent. Perhaps the most natural explanation is to be found
in the words of Christ to John and James "My chalice indeed you shall
drink" (Matthew 20:23)
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