The Gospel of St. John By J. B. Lightfoot - EXCERPT

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J . B . L I G H T F O O T

The Gospel of St. JohnA N e w l y D i s c o v e r e d C o m m e n t a r y

T H E L I G H T F O O T L E G A C Y S E T Volume 2

Edited by

BEN WITHERINGTON IIIand TODD D. STILL

Assisted byJEANETTE M. HAGEN



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J . B . L I G H T F O O T

The Gospel of St. John A N e w l y D i s c o v e r e d C o m m e n t a r y

THE LIGHTFOOT LEGACY SET

Volume

Edited byBEN WITHERINGTON III

and TODD D. STILL

Assis ted by

JEANETTE M. HAGEN

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication DataLightfoot, J. B. (Joseph Barber), - .

Te gospel of St. John : a newly discovered commentary / J. B. Lightfoot ; edited by Ben Witherington III and oddD. Still ; assisted by Jeanette M. Hagen.

pages cm. -- (Te Lightfoot legacy set ; Volume )Includes bibliographical references and index.ISBN - - - - (hardcover : alk. paper). Bible. John--Commentaries. I. Witherington, Ben, III, - editor. II. Still, odd D., editor. III. itle.

BS . .L . ’ --dc

P

Y




C

Abbreviations

Foreword

Editors’ Introduction: J. B. Light oot as Biblical Commentator

Introduction: External and Internal Evidences of the

Authenticity and Genuineness of the Fourth GospelThe Commentary on John 9

Excursus: he Logos Doctrine 8

he Prologue and the Preparation; the Wordand the Witness (John ) 8

Excursus: Evidence o the Authenticity andAuthorship o his Gospel 09

he Beginning o the Signs o the Messianic imes (John )

Excursus: he Chronology o St. John and the Synoptists 0

Nicodemus and the New Birth (John )

he Samaritan Woman and the Courtier’s Child (John ) A Sabbath Healing and the A termath (John )

Bread on Earth, Bread rom Heaven (John ) 8

Jesus the emple at the Feast o abernacles (John )

Excursus: he Question o the Authenticity o John : –8: 8

Jesus the Light and Abraham the Fore ather (John 8)

Jesus and the Man Born Blind (John 9) 8

he Good Shepherd and His Lost Sheep (John 0) 8




he Raising o Lazarus and the Plotting o the Foes (John ) 9

An Annoying Anointing (John ) 0

Appendix A: External Evidence or the Authenticity o the FourthGospel 0

Appendix B: More Internal Evidence or the Authenticityand Genuineness o St. John’s Gospel

Appendix C: Light oot and German Scholarship

on John’s Gospel (by Martin Hengel)

Author Index 9

Scripture Index




Introduction

E IE A

G F G

T A E H

Tis lecture originally ormed one o a series connected with Christian evi-dences, and delivered in St George’s Hall in . Te other lectures werepublished shortly aferwards; but, not having been in ormed be orehand thatpublication was expected, I withheld my own rom the volume. It seemed tome that in the course o a single lecture I could only touch the ringes o agreat subject, and that injustice would be done by such imper ect treatmentas alone time and opportunity allowed. Moreover I was then, and or someterms aferwards, engaged in lecturing on this Gospel at Cambridge, and Ientertained the hope that I might be able to deal with the subject less inad-equately i I gave mysel more time. Happily it passed into other and better

1Reprinted rom the Expositor o January–March, .2In act, Light oot’s long-lost lecture notes on John, which orm the commentary proper below,give us some precise in ormation on this point—the lectures are labeled Michaelmas erm ,and then this is crossed out and labeled in pencil, suggesting all the pencil additions andcorrections come rom the later delivery o the lectures on John. What this in turn means is thatthis introductory material was written and published a er Light oot had been lecturing on theFourth Gospel in Cambridge or some time. It appears to have been written rst in , withthe additional pre ace rom , the year Light oot died.




G S . J

hands [i.e., Westcott’s], and I was relieved rom this care.A rumor got abroad at the time, and has (I am in ormed) been since re-

peated, that I did not allow the lecture to be published, because I was dis-satised with it. I was only dissatised in the sense that I have already ex-plained. It could not be otherwise than unsatis actory to bring orward mere

ragmentary evidence o an important conclusion, when there was abundantproo in the background. Te present publication o the lecture is my answerto this rumor. I give it afer eighteen years exactly in the same orm in whichit was originally written, with the exception o a ew verbal alterations.

Looking over it again afer this long lapse o time, I have nothing to withdraw.Additional study has only strengthened my conviction that this narrative

o St. John could not have been written by any one butan eye-witness. AsI have not dealt with the external evidence except or the sake o supplyinga statement o the position o antagonists, the treatment suffers less than itwould otherwise have done rom not being brought down to date. I havementioned by way o illustration two respects in which later discoveries had

alsied Baur’s contentions. Te last eighteen years would supply severalothers. I will single out three: ( ) Te antagonists o the Ignatian Epistles areagain put on their de ense. Te arguments which were adduced against thegenuineness o these epistles will hold no longer. Ignatius has the testimonyo his riend and contemporary Polycarp, and Polycarp has the testimony ohis own personal disciple Irenaeus. Te testimony o Irenaeus is denied byno one; the testimony o Polycarp is only denied because it certies the Ig-natian letters. Be ore we are prepared to snap this chain o evidence rudely,and to break with an uninterrupted tradition, we require ar stronger reasonsthan have been hitherto adduced; ( ) Justin Martyr wrote be ore or aboutthe middle o the second century. His use o the Fourth Gospel was at onetime systematically denied by the impugners o its apostolic authorship.Now it is acknowledged almost universally, even by those who do not allowthat this evangelical narrative was written by St. John himsel ; ( ) Te Diates-saron o atian was written about . . , and consisted o a ‘Harmony o

3Recent treatments o the Fourth Gospel have begun to consider again this possibility in one ormor another a er such an idea had been regularly dismissed or some decades. See, e.g., the com-mentaries by Keener, Lincoln, Witherington and the detailed work o Richard Bauckham in hismonograph titled Jesus and the Eyewitnesses(Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, ).




External and Internal Evidences of the Authenticity and Genuineness of the Fourth Gospel

Four Gospels.’ Baur and others contended that at all events St. John was notone o the our. Indeed how could it be? For it had not been written, or only

recently written, at this time. Te Diatessaron itsel has been discovered, anda commentary o Ephrem Syrus upon it in Armenian has likewise beenunearthed within the last ew years, both showing that it began with theopening words o St. John. [ ]

E E J ’ AB R

Te ourth o our canonical Gospels has been ascribed by the tradition othe Church to St. John the son o Zebedee, the personal disciple o our Lord,and one o the twelve apostles. ill within a century (I might almost say, tillwithin a generation) o the present time, this has been the universal belie ,with one single and unimportant exception, o all ages, o all churches, o allsects, o all individuals alike. Tis unanimity is the more remarkable in theearlier ages o the Church, because the language o this gospel has a veryintimate bearing on numberless theological controversies that started up inthe second, third, and ourth centuries o the Christian era; and it wasthere ore the direct interest o one party or other to deny the apostolic au-thority, i they had any ground or doing so. Tis happened not once or twiceonly, but many times.

It would be difficult to point to a single heresy promulgated be ore theclose o the ourth century, that might not nd some imaginary points ocoincidence or some real points o conict, some relations whether o an-tagonism or o sympathy, with this gospel. Tis was equally true o Mon-tanism in the second century, and o Arianism in the ourth. Te FourthGospel would necessarily be among the most important authorities, wemight airly say the most important authority, in the settlement o the con-troversy, both rom the claims which it made as a product o the belovedapostle himsel , and rom the striking representations which it gives o ourLord’s teaching. Te de ender or the impugner o this or that theologicalopinion would have had a direct interest in disproving its genuineness anddenying its authority. Can we question that this would have been done againand again, i there had been any haze o doubt hanging over its origin, i theantagonist could have ound even a prima facie ground or an attack?




G S . J

And this brings me to speak o that one exception to the universal tra-dition to which I have already alluded. Once, and once only, did the dispu-

tants in a theological controversy yield to the temptation, strong though itmust have been.

A small, unimportant, nameless sect, i indeed they were compact enoughto orm a sect, in the latter hal o the second century, denied that the Gospeland the Apocalypse were written by St. John. Tese are the two canonicalwritings which especially attribute the title o the Word o God, the Logos,to our Lord: the one, in the opening verses, ‘In the beginning was the Word,

and the Word was with God, and the Word was God’; the other, in the visiono Him who rides on the white horse, whose garments are stained withblood, and whose name is given as the ‘Word o God.’ o dispose o thedoctrine they discredited the writings.

Epiphanius calls them Alogi, ‘the opponents o the Word,’ or (as it mightbe translated, or it is capable o a double meaning) ‘the irrational ones.’ Tename is avowedly his own invention. Indeed they would scarcely have ac-knowledged a title which had this double sense, and could have been soeasily turned against themselves. Tey appear only to disappear. Beyond oneor two casual allusions, they are not mentioned; they have no place in history.Tis is just one o those exceptions which strengthen the rule.

What these Alogi did, numberless other sectaries and heretics woulddoubtless have done, i there had been any sufficient ground or the course.But even these Alogi lend no countenance to the views o modern objectors.Modern critics play off the Apocalypse against the Gospel, allowing thegenuineness o the ormer, and using it to impugn the genuineness o thelatter. Moreover there is the greatest difference between the two. Te modernantagonist places the composition o the Fourth Gospel in the middle or thelatter hal o the second century; these ancient heretics ascribed it to theearly heresiarch Cerinthus, who lived at the close o the rst century, andwas a contemporary o St. John. Living themselves in the latter hal o thesecond century, they knew (as their opponents would have reminded them,i they had ound it convenient to orget the act) that the Gospel was not awork o yesterday, that it had already a long history, and that it went back at

4See Jn : ; Rev : respectively.





all events to the latest years o the apostolic age; and in their theory theywere obliged to recognize this act. I need hardly say that the doctrine o the

Person o Christ put orward in the Gospel and the Apocalypse is diametri-cally opposed to the teaching o Cerinthus, as every modern critic wouldallow. I only allude to this act, to show that these very persons, who ormthe single exception to the unanimous tradition o all the churches and allthe sects alike, are our witnesses or the antiquity o the Gospel (though not

or its authenticity), and there ore are witnesses against the modern im-pugners o its genuineness.

With this exception, the early testimony to the authenticity and genu-ineness o the Gospel is singularly varied. It is a remarkable and an im-portant act, that the most decisive and earliest testimony comes, not romFathers o the orthodox Church, but rom heretical writers. I cannot enterupon this question at length, or I did not undertake this afernoon to speako the external evidence; and I ask you to bear in mind, that any inadequateand cursory treatment necessarily does a great injustice to a subject like this;

or the ultimate effect o testimony must depend on its ullness and variety.I only call attention to the act that within the last ew years most valuableadditions have been made to this external testimony, and these rom theopposite extremes o the heretical scale.

At the one extreme we have Ebionism, which was the offspring o Juda-izing tendencies; at the other, Gnosticism, which took its rise in Gentile li-cense o speculation and practice. Ebionism is represented by a remarkableextant work belonging to the second century, possibly to the rst hal o thesecond century, the Clementine Homilies. Te greater part o this work haslong been known, but until within the last ew years the printed text wastaken rom a MS mutilated at the end; so that o the twenty Homilies the lasthal o the nineteenth and the whole o the twentieth are wanting. Teseearlier Homilies contained more than one re erence to gospel history whichcould not well be re erred to any o the three rst evangelists, and seemedcertainly to have been taken rom the ourth. Still the re erence was notabsolutely certain, and the impugners o St. John’s Gospel availed themselveso this doubt to deny the re erence to this gospel.

At length, in the year , Dressel published or the rst time, rom aVatican MS., the missing conclusion o these Homilies; and this was ound




G S . J

to contain a re erence to the incidents attending the healing o the manborn blind, related only by St. John, and related in a way distinctly char-

acteristic o St. John—a re erence so distinct, that no one rom that timehas attempted to deny or to dispute it. So much or the testimony o Ebi-onism, o the Judaic sects o early Christianity. But equally denite, andeven more ull, is the testimony which recent discovery has brought tolight on the side o Gnosticism. Many o my hearers will remember theinterest which was excited a ew years ago by the publication o a losttreatise on heresies, which Bunsen and others ascribed (and, as is now

generally allowed, correctly ascribed) to Hippolytus, in the earlier part othe third century. Tis treatise contains large and requent extracts romprevious Gnostic writers o diverse schools—Ophites, Basilideans, Valen-tinians; among them, rom a work which Hippolytus quotes as the pro-duction o Basilides himsel , who ourished about . . – . And inthese extracts are abundant quotations rom the Gospel o St. John. I haveput these two recent accessions to the external testimony in avor o theFourth Gospel side by side, because, emanating rom the most diversequarters, they have a peculiar value, as showing the extensive circulationand wide reception o this gospel at a very early date; and because also,having been brought to light soon afer its genuineness was or the rsttime seriously impugned, they seem providentially destined to urnish ananswer to the objections o recent criticism.

I we ask ourselves why we attribute this or that ancient writing to theauthor whose name it bears—why, or instance, we accept this tragedy as aplay o Sophocles, or that speech as an oration o Demosthenes, our answerwill be, that it bears the name o the author, and (so ar as we know) hasalways been ascribed to him. In very many cases we know nothing, or nextto nothing, about the history o the writing in question. In a ew instanceswe are ortunate enough to nd a re erence to it, or a quotation rom it, insome author who lived a century or two later. Te cases are exceptionallyrare when there is an indisputable allusion in a contemporary, or nearlycontemporary, writer. For the most part, we accept the act o the authorship,because it comes to us on the authority o a MS. or MSS. written severalcenturies afer the presumed author lived, supported in some cases by quo-tations in a late lexicographer, or grammarian, or collection o extracts. Te





external testimony in avor o St. John’s Gospel reaches back much nearer tothe writer’s own time, and is ar more extensive than can be produced in the

case o most classical writings o the same antiquity.From the character o the work also, this testimony gains additional

value; or where the contents o a book intimately affect the cherished be-lie s and the practical conduct o all who receive it, the universality o itsreception, amidst jarring creeds and conicting tendencies, is ar more sig-nicant than i its contents are indifferent, making no appeal to the reli-gious convictions, and claiming no inuence over the li e. We may be dis-

posed to complain that the external testimony is not so absolutely andnally conclusive in itsel that no door is open or hesitation, that all must,despite themselves, accept it, and that any investigation into the internalevidence is superuous and vain.

But this we have no right to demand. I it is as great, and more than asgreat, as would satis y us in any other case, this should suffice us. In all themost important matters which affect our interests in this world and ourhopes hereafer, God has lef some place or diversity o opinion, because Hewould not remove all opportunity o sel -discipline. I then the genuinenesso this gospel is supported by greater evidence than in ordinary cases weconsider conclusive, we approach the investigation o its internal characterwith a very strong presumption in its avor. Te onus probandi rests withthose who would impugn its genuineness, and nothing short o the ullestand most decisive marks o spuriousness can airly be considered sufficientto counterbalance this evidence.

As I proceed, I hope to make it clear that, allowing their ull weight to allthe difficulties (and it would be oolish to deny the existence o difficulties)in this gospel, still the internal marks o authenticity and genuineness are sominute, so varied, so circumstantial, and so unsuspicious, as to create anoverwhelming body o evidence in its avor. But be ore entering upon thisinvestigation, it may be worthwhile to inquire whether the hypotheses sug-gested by those who deny the genuineness o this gospel are themselves ree

rom all difficulties. For i it be a act (as I believe it is) that any alternativewhich has been proposed introduces greater perplexities than those whichit is intended to remove, we are bound (irrespective o any positive argu-ments in its avor) to all back upon the account which is exposed to ewest




G S . J

objections, and which at the same time is supported by a continuous anduniversal tradition.

We may take our start rom Baur’s theory, or he was the rst to developand systematize the attack on the genuineness o the Fourth Gospel. Ac-cording to Baur it was written about the year . Te external testimonyhowever is alone atal to this very late epoch; or, afer all wresting o evi-dence and post-dating o documents, it is impossible to deny that at thistime the gospel was, not only in existence, but also received ar and wideas a genuine document; that it was not only quoted occasionally, but had

even been commented upon as the actual work o St. John. Consequentlythe tendency o later impugners has been to push the date arther back,and to recede rom the extreme position o this, its most determined andablest antagonist.

Hilgen eld, who may be regarded as the successor o Baur, and the presentrepresentative o the übingen school (though it has no longer its head-quarters at übingen), would place its composition about the year ; andayler, who a ew years ago ( ) reproduced the argument o Baur and

others in England, is disposed to assign it to about the same date. With astrange inconsistency he suggests, towards the close o his book, that its trueauthor may have been John the presbyter, though John the presbyter isstated by Papias (who had conversed with this John, and rom whom all thein ormation we possess respecting him is derived) to have been a personaldisciple o our Lord, and there ore could hardly have been older than Johnthe apostle, and certainly could not have been living towards the middle othe second century. Tis tendency to recede nearer and nearer to the evan-gelist’s own age shows that the pressure o acts has begun to tell on thetheories o antagonistic criticism, and we may look orward to the timewhen it will be held discreditable to the reputation o any critic or sobrietyand judgment to assign to this gospel any later date than the end o the rstcentury, or the very beginning o the second.

5Light oot, o course, lived be ore the discovery o various Greek ragments o the Gospel o John,probably dating to the second century, particularly P . Tis would have urther supported hiscase about the dating o the Fourth Gospel. On the other hand, another piece o evidence broughtto light by M. Oberweis (“Das Martyrium der Zebedaiden in Mk. . - (Mt. . - ) undOf . - ,” New estament Studies [ ]: - ) provides us with a re erence to the pos-sible early demise o John son o Zebedee, suffering a ate like his brother, who died in . . .





T I S N

But meanwhile, let us take the earliest o these dates ( . . ) as less encum-

bered with difficulties, and there ore more avorable to the opponents o itsgenuineness, and ask whether a gospel written at such a time would probablyhave presented the phenomena which we actually nd in the ourth ca-nonical gospel. We may interrogate alike its omissions and its contents. Onthis hypothesis, how are we to account or what it has lef unsaid, and orwhat it has said? Certainly it must be regarded as a remarkable phenomenon,that on many ecclesiastical questions that then agitated the minds o Chris-

tians it is wholly silent, while to others it gives no distinct and authoritativeanswer. Our Lord’s teaching has indeed its bearing on the controversies othe second century, as on those o the ourth, or o the twelfh, or o thesixteenth, or o the nineteenth, but, as in these latter instances, its lessonsare in erential rather than direct, they are elicited by pain ul investigation,they are contained implicitly in our Lord’s li e and person, they do not lie onthe sur ace, nor do they offer denite solutions o denite difficulties.

ake, or instance, the dispute concerning the episcopate. Contrast theabsolute silence o this gospel respecting this institution with the declarationsin the Epistles o Ignatius. A modern de ender o the episcopate will appealto the commission given to the apostles (John : , ). I need not stop hereto inquire to what extent it avors his views. But obviously it is quite insuffi-cient by itsel . It would serve almost equally well or an apostolically ordainedministry o any kind, or a presbyteral as or an episcopal succession. Is itpossible that a writer, composing a gospel at the very time when the authorityo this office had been called in question, i a supporter o the power o theepiscopate, would have resisted the temptation o inserting something whichwould convey a sanction, i an opponent, something which would convey adisparagement, o this office, in our Lord’s own name?

Or, again: take the Gnostic theories o emanations. Any one who hasstudied the history o the second century will know how large a place theyoccupy in the theological disputes o the day; what grotesque and varied

orms they assume in the speculations o different heretical teachers; whatdiverse arguments, some valid, some anci ul, are urged against them by

6See the excursus below (pp. - ) at the end o John on these matters.




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orthodox writers. Would a orger have hesitated or a moment to slay thismany-headed hydra by one well-aimed blow? What can we suppose to have

been the object o such a orger, except to advance certain theological views? And why should he have let slip the very opportunity, which (wemust suppose) he was making or himsel , o condemning the worst ormso heresy rom our Lord’s own lips? It is true that you and I think we see(and doubtless think rightly), that the doctrine o God the Word taught inSt. John’s Gospel is the real answer to the theological questionings whichgave rise to all these theories about aeons or emanations, and involves im-

plicitly and indirectly the re utation o all such theories. But it is only bymore or less abstruse reasoning that we arrive at this conclusion. Te earlyGnostics did not see it so; they used St. John’s Gospel, and retained theirtheories notwithstanding.

A orger would have taken care to provide a direct re utation that it wasimpossible to misunderstand. Or, again, about the middle o the second centurythe great controversy respecting the time o celebrating Easter was beginningto lif up its head. For the latter hal o this century the eud raged, bursting outever a resh and disturbing the peace o the Church again and again, until it wasnally set at rest in the ourth century at the Council o Nicaea.

Was the estival o the Lord’s resurrection to be celebrated always on thesame day o the week, the Sunday? Or was it to be guided by the time o theJewish Passover, and thus to take place on the same day o the month, ir-respective o the day o the week? Each community, each individual, took aside in this controversy. Unimportant in itsel , it seriously endangered theexistence o the Church. Te daring adventurer who did not hesitate to orgea whole gospel would certainly not be deterred by any scruple rom settingthe matter at rest by a ew strokes o the pen. His narrative urnished morethan one avorable opportunity or interposing hal a dozen decisive wordsin our Lord’s name, and yet he abstained. Tus we might take in successionthe distinctive ecclesiastical controversies o the second century, and showhow the writer o the Fourth Gospel holds aloo rom them all, certainly astrange and almost incredible act, i this writer lived about the middle, oreven in the latter hal , o the century, and, as a romancer, was not restrainedby those obligations o act which etter the truth ul historian who is himsela contemporary o the events recorded!




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than to detect it when invented. Te age which could not expose a coarse forgery was incapable of constructing a subtle historical romance.

Tis one thing I hope to make clear in the short time that is allowed methis afernoon. Te Fourth Gospel, i a orgery, shows the most consummateskill on the part o the orger; it is (as we should say in modern phrase)thoroughly in keeping. It is replete with historical and geographical details;it is interpenetrated with the Judaic spirit o the times; its delineations ocharacter are remarkably subtle; it is per ectly natural in the progress o theevents; the allusions to incidents or localities or modes o thought are intro-

duced in an artless and unconscious way, being closely interwoven with thetexture o the narrative; while throughout, the author has exercised a silenceand a sel -restraint about his assumed personality which is without a parallelin ancient orgeries, and which deprives his work o the only motive that, onthe supposition o its spuriousness, would account or his undertaking it atall. In all these respects it orms a direct contrast to the known orgeries othe apostolic or succeeding ages. I will only ask my hearers who are ac-quainted with early apocryphal literature to compare St. John’s Gospel withtwo very different and yet equally characteristic products o the rst andsecond centuries o the Christian era—with the Protevangelium, or Gospelof the Infancy of Jesus, on the one hand, and with the Clementine Homilies,on the other. Te ormer, a vulgar daub dashed in by a coarse hand in brightand startling colors; the other, a subtle philosophical romance, elaboratelydrawn by an able and skill ul artist. But both the one and the other are obvi-ously articial in all their traits, and utterly alien to the tone o genuinehistory. Such productions as these show what we might expect to nd in agospel written at the middle or afer the middle o the second century. Ithen my description o the Fourth Gospel is not overcharged (and I willendeavor to substantiate it immediately), the supposition that this gospelwas written at this late epoch by a resident at Alexandria or at Ephesus willappear in the highest degree incredible; and, whatever difficulties the tradi-tional belie may involve, they are small indeed compared with the improb-abilities created by the only alternative hypothesis.

T P I E

I have already proved that the absence o certain topics in this gospel seems





atal to its late authorship. I shall now proceed to investigate those phe-nomena o its actual contents which orce us to the conclusion that it was

written by a Jew contemporary with and cognizant o the acts which herelates, and more especially those indications which x the authorship onthe Apostle St. John. It is necessary however to premise by way o caution,that exhaustive treatment is impossible in a single lecture, and that I canonly hope to indicate a line o investigation which any one may ollow out

or himsel .First o all then, the writer was a Jew. Tis might be in erred with a very

high degree o probability rom his Greek style alone. It is not ungram-matical Greek, but it is distinctly Greek o one long accustomed to think andspeak through the medium o another language. Te Greek language is sin-gularly rich in its capabilities o syntactic construction, and it is also well

urnished with various connecting particles. Te two languages with whicha Jew o Palestine would be most amiliar—the Hebrew, which was the lan-guage o the sacred Scriptures, and the Aramaic, which was the medium ocommunication in daily li e—being closely allied to each other, stand indirect contrast to the Greek in this respect. Tere is comparative poverty oinexions, and there is an extreme paucity o connecting and relative par-ticles. Hence in Hebrew and Aramaic there is little or no syntax, properly socalled. ested by his style then, the writer was a Jew.

O all the New estament writings the Fourth Gospel is the most dis-tinctly Hebraic in this respect. Te Hebrew simplicity o diction will at oncestrike the reader. Tere is an entire absence o periods, or which the Greeklanguage affords such acility. Te sentences are co-ordinated, not subordi-nated. Te clauses are strung together, like beads on a string. Te very mo-notony o arrangement, though singularly impressive, is wholly unlike theGreek style o the age. More especially does the inuence o the Hebrewappear in the connecting particles. In this language the single connectingparticle is used equally, whether co-ordination or opposition is implied; inother words, it represents ‘but’ as well as ‘and.’ Te Authorized Version doesnot adequately represent this act, or our translators have exercised consid-erable license in varying the renderings : ‘then,’ ‘moreover,’ ‘and,’ ‘but,’ etc.

Now it is a noticeable act, that in St. John’s Gospel the capabilities o theGreek language in this respect are most commonly neglected; the writer alls




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back on the simple ‘and’ o Hebrew diction, using it even where we shouldexpect to nd an adversative particle. Tus : , , ‘You search the Scrip-

tures, or in them you think that you have eternal li e, and they are theywhich testi y o Me: and you will not come to Me’; : , ‘Did not Moses giveyou the law, and none o you keeps the law?’ where our English version hasinserted an adversative particle to assist the sense, ‘and yet’; : , ‘Ten theysought to take Him, and no man laid hands on Him,’ where the English

version substitutes ‘but no man’; : , ‘Ten said Jesus unto them. “Yet a littlewhile am I with you, and I go to Him that sent Me,”’ where again our trans-

lators attempt to improve the sense by reading ‘and then.’ And instancesmight be multiplied.

Te Hebrew character o the diction moreover shows itsel in other ways—by the parallelism o the sentences, by the repetition o the same words indifferent clauses, by the order o the words, by the syntactical constructions,and by individual expressions. Indeed so completely is this character main-tained throughout, that there is hardly a sentence which might not be trans-lated literally into Hebrew or Aramaic, without any violence to the languageor to the sense. I might point also to the interpretation o Aramaic words, asCephas, Gabbatha, Golgotha, Messias, Rabboni, Siloam, Tomas, as indi-cating knowledge o this language.

On such isolated phenomena however no great stress can airly be laid,because such interpretations do not necessarily require an extensive acquain-tance with the language, and when the whole cast and coloring o the dictioncan be put in evidence, an individual word here and there is valueless incomparison. Tere are however two examples o proper names in this Gospelon which it may be worthwhile to remark, because the original is obscuredin our English Bibles by a alse reading in the Greek text used by our trans-lators, and because they afford incidentally somewhat strong testimony to thewriter’s knowledge both o the language and o contemporary acts.

Te rst o these is Iscariot. In the other three Gospels this name is at-tributed to the traitor apostle Judas alone. In St. John’s Gospel also, as rep-resented in the received text and in our English version, this is the case. Buti the more correct readings be substituted, on the authority o the ancientcopies, we nd it sometimes applied to Judas himsel ( : , : , : ), andsometimes to Judas’ ather Simon (e.g. : ‘He spoke o Judas the son o





Simon Iscariot’; : , ‘He gives it to Judas the son o Simon Iscariot’). Nowthis shows that the evangelist knew this not to be a proper name strictly so

called, but to describe the native place o the person, ‘the man o Kerioth,’and hence to be applicable to the ather and the son alike. Te other in-stance which I shall give, at rst sight presents a difficulty; but when urtherinvestigated it only adds resh testimony to the exact knowledge o theFourth Evangelist.

In St. Matthew, Simon Peter is called Bar-Jona (Matt. : ); i.e. son oJona (or Jonan or Jonas). Accordingly, in the received text o St. John also he

appears in not less than our passages ( : , : - ) as Simon son o Jona(or Jonan or Jonas). But there can be no reasonable doubt that the correctreading in all these our passages is ‘Simon son o Joannes’—the Hebrew andAramaic Johanan, the English John, and that later transcribers have alteredit to make it accord with the orm adopted by St. Matthew. Here there is anapparent discrepancy, which however disappears on examination; or wend that Jona or Jonan or Jonas is more than once used in the versiono the Old estament as a contracted orm o the name Johanan, Johannes,or John. Tus the statements o the two evangelists are reconciled; and weowe it to the special knowledge derived rom the Fourth Gospel that the ulland correct orm is preserved. For, when we have once got this key to the

act, we can no longer question that John was the real name o Peter’s ather,since it throws great light on our Lord’s words in St. Matthew.

Te ordinary name Jonah, which was borne by the prophet, and which isgenerally supposed to be the name o Simon’s ather, signies ‘a dove,’ butthe name Johanan or John is ‘the grace o God.’ Hence the Baptist is callednot Zechariah, as his relatives thought natural, but John, in accordance withthe heavenly message (Luke : ), because he was specially given to hisparents by God’s grace. So too the call o St. Peter (John : ) becomes ullo meaning: ‘Tou art Simon the son o the grace o God; thou shalt be calledCephas,’ and the nal commission given to the same apostle is doubly sig-nicant, when we interpret the thrice repeated appeal as ‘Simon son o God’sgrace, lovest thou Me?’ or without this interpretation the studied repetitiono his patronymic seems somewhat meaningless.

Bearing this act in mind, we turn to the passage o St. Matthew ( : , )‘Jesus answered and said unto him, “Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jona (son




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o the grace o God), or esh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, butMy Father which is in heaven. And I say unto thee—Tat thou art Peter, and

upon this rock I will build My Church.”’ His name and his surname alike aresymbols and oreshadowings o God’s special avor to him in his call andcommission. Tis is only one o many instances in which the authenticity othe statements o the Fourth Gospel is conrmed by the act that they inci-dentally explain what is otherwise unexplained in the narrative o the syn-optic evangelists.

Another evidence that the writer was acquainted with the Hebrew lan-

guage is urnished by the quotations rom the Old estament. Tis evan-gelist, like St. Paul, sometimes cites rom the current Greek version o theSeventy, and sometimes translates directly rom the Hebrew. When a writer,as is the case in the Epistle to the Hebrews, quotes largely and quotes uni-

ormly rom the version, this is at least an indication that he was notacquainted with the original; and hence we in er that the epistle just men-tioned was not written by St. Paul, a Hebrew o the Hebrews, but by somedisciple, a Hellenistic Jew, thoroughly interpenetrated with the apostle’smind and teaching, but ignorant o the language o his ore athers. I on anyoccasion the quotations o a writer accord with the original Hebrew againstthe version, we have a right to in er that he was acquainted with thesacred language, was, in act, a Hebrew or Aramaic-speaking Jew.

Several decisive examples might be produced, but one must suffice. In: is a quotation rom Zechariah : , which in the original is, ‘Tey

shall look upon Me whom they pierced.’ Accordingly it is given in St. John,‘Tey shall look on Him whom they pierced’ ( Ὄψονται εἰς ὃν ἐξεκέντησαν).But the rendering is, ‘Tey shall gaze upon Me, because they insulted’where the Greek rendering has not a single word in common with St. John’stext. In : again, the evangelist quotes Isaiah : , ‘Because that Esaiassaid again, He hath blinded their eyes, and hardened their heart, that theyshould not see with their eyes,’ etc. Now this quotation is ar rom being

verbally exact, or in the Hebrew the sentence is imperative, ‘Make at theheart o this people, and make heavy their ears, and close their eyes, thatthey should not see with their eyes,’ etc. Yet, on the other hand, it does notcontain any o the characteristic renderings o the , and this is onedistinct proo that, however loosely quoted, it was derived, not rom the





, but rom the original. For the translators, taking offense, as itwould seem, at ascribing the hardening o the heart to God’s own agency,

have thrown the sentence into a passive orm: ‘Te heart o this people wasmade at, and with their ears they heard heavily, and their eyes they closed’etc., so as to remove the difficulty. I there ore the evangelist had derivedthe passage rom the , it is inconceivable that he would have reintro-duced the active orm, thus wantonly reviving a difficulty, unless he had theoriginal be ore him.

I will only add one other example. In : occurs a quotation rom Psalm

: ( : ). Here the expression that in the original signies literally ‘madegreat’ or ‘made high his heel’ is correctly translated ‘lifed up his heel’ (ἐπῆρενἐπ’ ἐμὲ τὴν πτέρναν αὐτοῦ), as in the A.V. o the Psalms. Te versionhowever gives ‘he multiplied (or increased) tripping up with the heel,’ or‘treachery,’ that has given rise to the paraphrastic rendering in our Prayer-Book version, ‘laid great wait or me.’ Here again it is obvious that the evan-gelist’s quotation could not have been derived rom the , but must havebeen rendered either directly rom the Hebrew, or (what or my purpose isequally decisive) indirectly through some Chaldee argum.

I there ore we had no other evidence than the language, we might withcondence affirm that this Gospel was not written either by a Gentile or bya Hellenistic Christian, but by a Hebrew accustomed to speak the languageo his athers. Tis act alone negates more than one hypothesis which hasbeen broached o late years respecting its authorship, or it is wholly incon-sistent with the strictly Gentile origin which most recent theories assign toit. But, though irreconcilable with Gentile authorship, it is not wholly incon-sistent with the later date, or we cannot pronounce it quite impossible thatthere should be living in Asia Minor or in Egypt, in the middle or afer themiddle o the second century, a Judaic Christian amiliar with the Hebrewor Aramaic language, however rare such instances may have been.

Having thus established the act that the writer was neither a Gentile nora Hellenist, but a Hebrew o the Hebrews, we will proceed to inquire urtherwhether he evinces an acquaintance with the manners and eelings, and alsowith the geography and history (more especially the contemporary history)o Palestine, which so ar as our knowledge goes (and in dealing with suchquestions we must not advance one step beyond our knowledge) would be




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morally impossible with even a Hebrew Christian at the supposed date, longafer the political existence o the nation had been obliterated, and when the

disorganization o Jewish society was complete.As I am obliged to compress my remarks within the space o a single

lecture, I cannot place the evidence ully be ore you; but my hope is, that Imay indicate the lines o investigation which will enable you to answer itmore completely or yourselves. I will only say, that we obtain rom theFourth Gospel details at once uller and more minute on all these pointsthan rom the other three. Whether we turn to the Messianic hopes o the

chosen people, with all the attendant circumstances with which imaginationhad invested this expected event, or to the mutual relations o Samaritans,Jews, Galileans, Romans, and the respective eelings, prejudices, belie s,customs o each, or to the topography as well o the city and the temple aso the rural districts—the Lake o Gennesaret, and the cornelds andmountain ridges o Shechem, or to the contemporary history o the Jewishhierarchy and the Herodian sovereignty, we are alike struck at every turnwith subtle and unsuspicious traces, betokening the amiliarity with whichthe writer moves amidst the ever-shifing scenes o his wonder ul narrative.

Tis minuteness o detail in the Fourth Evangelist is very commonly over-looked, because our gaze is arrested by still more important and unique

eatures in this Gospel. Te striking character o our Lord’s discourses asrecorded in St. John—their length and sequence, their simplicity o language,their ullness and depth o meaning—dazzles the eye o the critic and blindshim to the historical aspects o the narrative. Only by concentrating our viewon these latter shall we realize the truth that the evangelist is not oating inthe clouds o airy theological speculations, that though with his eye he peersinto the mysteries o the unseen, his oot is planted on the solid ground oexternal act; that, in short, the incidents are not invented as a ramework

or the doctrine, but that the doctrine arises naturally out o , and derives itsmeaning rom, the incidents.

One example will serve at once to illustrate the double characteristic othis Gospel, the accurate historical narrative o acts which orms the basiso the Gospel, and the theological teaching which is built as a superstructure

7He was, however, able to write a lengthy essay on the external evidence in more detail, which canbe ound in appendix A below.





upon this oundation, and which the evangelist keeps distinctly and persis-tently in view in his selection and arrangement o the acts, and also to in-

troduce the investigation which I purpose instituting.Te narrative and the discourses alike are thoroughly saturated with the

Messianic ideas o the time. Te Christ, as expected by the Jews, is the onecentral gure round which all the acts are grouped, the one main topic onwhich all the conversations hinge. Tis is the more remarkable, because theleading conception in the writer’s own mind is not the Messiah, but theWord, the Logos—not the deliverance o Israel, but the mani estation o God

in the esh. Tis main purpose is ung out at the opening o the Gospel, andit is kept steadily in view in the selection o materials throughout the work.But it does not once enter into the mind o the Jews, who are wholly ab-sorbed in the Messianic idea. Nay, the word Logosdoes not once occur evenon our Lord’s own lips, though the obvious motive o His teaching is toen orce this higher aspect o His person, to which they were strangers. AndI cannot but think that this distinct separation is a remarkable testimony tothe credibility o the writer, who, however strongly impressed with hismission as the teacher o a great theological conception, nevertheless keepsit ree rom his narrative o acts, though obviously there would be a verystrong temptation to introduce it, a temptation which to a mere orger wouldbe irresistible.

Te Messianic idea, or instance, is turned about on all sides, and pre-sented in every aspect. On this point we learn very much more o contem-porary Jewish opinion rom the Fourth Gospel than rom the other three.At the commencement and at the close o the narrative—in the preaching othe Baptist and in the incidents o the Passion—it is equally prominent. InGalilee ( : , , ; : , , sq.), in Samaria ( : , , ), in Judaea ( :

sq.; : sq., - ; : sq.; : ), it is the one standing theme o conver-sation. Among riends, among oes, among neutrals alike it is mooted anddiscussed. Te person and character o Jesus are tried by this standard. Heis accepted or He is rejected, as He ullls or contradicts the received idealo the Messiah.

Te accessories also o the Messiah’s coming, as conceived by the Jews,are brought out with a completeness beyond the other Gospels. I will onlyask you, as an illustration o this, to consider the discourse on the manna




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in the sixth chapter. Te key to the meaning o the conversation is the actthat the Jews expected a miracle similar to the gif o manna in the wil-

derness, as an accompaniment o the appearance o the great deliverer. Tisexpectation throws a ood o light on the whole discourse. But the act isnot communicated in the passage itsel . Tere is only a bald, isolatedstatement, which apparently is suggested by nothing, and itsel ails tosuggest anything: ‘Our athers did eat manna in the wilderness.’ Tencomes an aposiopesis. Te in erence is unexpressed. Te expectation, whichexplains all, is lef to be in erred, because it would be mentally supplied by

men brought up among the ideas o the time. We ourselves have to get it bythe aid o criticism and research rom rabbinical authorities. But, when wehave grasped it, we can unlock the meaning o the whole chapter. Con-nected with Messiah’s coming are other conceptions on which it may beworthwhile to dwell or a moment. One o these is the appearance o amysterious person called ‘the prophet.’ Tis expectation arose out o theannouncement in Deuteronomy : , ‘Te Lord thy God will raise up untothee a prophet rom the midst o thee, like unto me.’ o this anticipation wehave allusions in not less than our places in St. John ( : , ; : ; : ), inall o which ‘the prophet’ is mentioned, though in the three rst the dis-tinctness o the expectation is blurred in the English version by the ren-dering ‘that prophet.’ In all these passages the mention o ‘the prophet’without any explanation is most natural on the lips o contemporary Jews,whose minds were lled with the Messianic conceptions o the times, whilesuch language is extremely unlikely to have been invented or them morethan a century afer the date o the supposed occurrences. But the pointespecially to be observed is, that the orm which the conception takes isstrictly Jewish, and not Christian. Christian teachers identied the prophet

oretold by Moses with our Lord Himsel , and there ore with the Christ.Tis application o the prophecy is made directly in St. Peter’s speech (Acts

: ), and in erentially in St. Stephen’s (Acts : ); and later Christianteachers ollowed in their steps. But these Jews in St. John’s Gospel conceive‘the Christ’ and ‘the prophet’ as two different persons. I He is not ‘theChrist,’ they adopt the alternative that He may be ‘the prophet’ ( : , ); inot ‘the prophet,’ then ‘the Christ’ ( : ). It is hardly conceivable to mymind that a Christian writer, living in or afer the middle o the second





century, calling on his imagination or acts, should have divested himselso absolutely o the Christian idea and allen back on the Jewish.

But be ore I have done with ‘the prophet,’ there is yet one more pointworthy o notice. Afer the miracle o eeding the ve thousand, we are toldthat ‘those men who had seen the miracle that Jesus did said, “Tis is o atruth the prophet that should come into the world”’ ( : ). Te connectionis not obvious, and the writer has not explained himsel . Here again themissing link is supplied by the Messianic conception o the age. Te prophet

oretold was to be like Moses himsel . Hence, it was in erred that there must

be a parallel in the works o the two. Hence a repetition o the gif o themanna—the bread rom heaven—might be expected. Was not this miraclethen the very ulllment o their expectation? Hence we read that on the day

ollowing (afer several incidents have intervened, but with the miracle stillresh on their minds), they seek Him out, and still try to elicit a denite

answer rom Him: ‘What sign do you then? Our athers did eat manna inthe desert.’ Tus a casual and indistinct re erence in one part o the chapteris explained by an equally casual and indistinct re erence in another, andlight emerges rom darkness.

From the Messianic ideas I turn to the Jewish sects and the Levitical hi-erarchy. Te Sadducees, with whom we are amiliar in other Gospels, are notonce mentioned by the Fourth Evangelist. How are we to account or this

act? Have we here a discrepancy, or (i not a discrepancy) at least an incon-gruity? Is there in St. John’s picture an entire omission o that group whichoccupies a prominent place on the canvas o the other evangelists, especiallyo St. Matthew?

Te common connection, when describing the adversaries o our Lord, is‘the Pharisees and Sadducees’ in the Synoptic evangelists, ‘the chie priestsand the Pharisees’ in St. John. In the comparison o these phrases lies thesolution. Te high priests at this time belonged to the sect o the Sadducees.How this happened we do not know. It may be that their Roman rulers a-

vored this party, as being more lukewarm than the Pharisees in religiousmatters, and there ore less likely to give trouble to the civil powers. At allevents, the act appears distinctly rom more than one notice in the narrativeo the Acts ( : ; : ); and the same is stated in a passage o Josephus ( Ant .xx. . ). Tus, a real coincidence arises rom an apparent incongruity.




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But Josephus elsewhere ( Ant. xviii. . ) makes another statement re-specting the Pharisees, which throws great light on the narrative o the

Fourth Evangelist. He tells us that the Sadducees were ew in number, thougho the highest rank; and that when they were in office, they were orced, evenagainst their will, to listen to the Pharisees, because otherwise they wouldnot be tolerated by the people. Now this is precisely the order o events in St.John. Te Pharisees (with one single exception) always take the initiative;they are the active opponents o our Lord, and the chie priests step in toexecute their will.

Te single exception is remarkable. Once only we nd chie priests actingalone and acting promptly ( : ). Tey orm a plot or putting Lazarus todeath. Tis was essentially a Sadducees’ question. It was necessary that aliving witness to the great truth, which the high-priestly party denied,should be got rid o at all hazards. Hence they bestir themselves and throwoff their usual apathy; just as, turning rom the Gospels to the Acts o theApostles, they have taken the place o the Pharisees as the oremost perse-cutors o the new aith, because the resurrection rom the dead was thecardinal topic o the preaching o the Apostles.

But there is one other notice o the Jewish historian with which the nar-rative o the Fourth Evangelist presents a striking but unsuspicious coinci-dence. We are somewhat startled with the outburst o rudeness that marksthe chie o the party on one occasion ( : , ). ‘One o them, Caiaphas,being high priest that year, said unto them. “You know nothing at all, andyou do not reect that it is expedient or you that one man should die or thepeople, and that the whole nation should not perish.”’ As a comment on this,take the words o Josephus: ‘Te behavior o the Sadducees to one anotheris not a little rude, and their intercourse with their peers is brusque, as iaddressing strangers’ (Bell. Jud . ii. . ).

Tese coincidences need little comment. I will only add that the FourthEvangelist does not himsel give us the key to the incidents, that the re er-ences have been gathered rom three different parts o Josephus, that thestatements in the evangelist are not embroideries on his narrative, but arewoven into its very texture and that nevertheless all these several noticesdovetail together and create one harmonious whole, which bears the veryimpress o strict historical truth.





Afer reviewing these coincidences, it will appear strange that rom thepassage last quoted, Baur derived what he obviously considered to be one o

his strongest arguments against the authenticity o the Gospel. Because theevangelist three times speaks o Caiaphas as ‘high priest that year’ ( : , ;

: ), he argues that the writer supposed the high priesthood to be anannual office, and there ore could not have been the Apostle John. Nowunless I have entirely misled you and mysel , this is incredible. You cannotimagine that one who shows an acquaintance, not only with the language,but also with the customs, eelings, history, topography o the race, even in

their minute details, should yet be ignorant o this most elementary act oJewish institutions. Whether the Gospel is authentic or whether it is not,such a supposition is equally incredible. I the writing is a orgery, the orgerwas certainly highly in ormed and extremely subtle; he must have ransackeddivers histories or his acts; and yet here he is credited with a degree o ig-norance which a casual glance at a ew pages o his Old estament or hisJosephus would at once have served to dissipate. Suppose a parallel case.Imagine one, who writing (we will say) a historical work, shows a subtleappreciation o political eeling in England, and a minute acquaintance withEnglish social institutions, and yet alls into the error o supposing that thepremier is elected annually by vote o the people, or that the lord-mayoraltyis a hereditary office tenable or li e.

I there ore this supposition is simply impossible, we must explain theexpression, ‘high priest that year,’ in some other way. And the explanationseems to be this—the most important duty o the high priest was an annual

unction, the sacrice and intercession or the people on the great day oatonement. ‘Once every year,’ says the writer o the Epistle to the Hebrews( : ), ‘the high priest alone enters into the second tabernacle (the inner sanc-tuary), not without blood, which he offers or himsel and or the errors othe people.’ Te year o which the evangelist speaks was the year o all years,‘the acceptable year o the Lord,’ as it is elsewhere called; the year in whichthe great sacrice, the one atonement, was made, the atonement which an-nulled once and or ever the annual repetitions. It so happened that it wasthe duty o Caiaphas, as high priest, to enter the holy o holies, and offer theatonement or that year. Te evangelist sees, i we may use the phrase withoutirreverence, a dramatic propriety in the act that he o all men should make




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this declaration. By a Divine irony he is made unconsciously to declare thetruth, proclaiming Jesus to be the great atoning sacrice, and himsel to be

instrumental in offering the victim. Tis irony o circumstances is illustratedin the case o Pilate, as in the case o Caiaphas. Te latter, the representativeo the Jewish hierarchy, pronounces Jesus the great atoning sacrice; the

ormer, the representative o the civil power, pronounces Him as the sov-ereign o the race, ‘Behold your King!’ Te malignity o Caiaphas and thesneer o Pilate alike bear witness to a higher truth than they themselvesconsciously apprehend.

From the sects and the hierarchy we may turn to the city and the temple.Here too we should do well to bear in mind how largely we owe the dis-tinctive eatures o the topography and architecture with which we are a-miliar to the Fourth Gospel. Within the sacred precincts themselves thePorch o Solomon, within the Holy City the pools o Bethsaida, and Siloam,are brought be ore our eyes by this evangelist alone. And when we passoutside the walls, he is still our guide. From him we trace the steps o theLord and His disciples on that atal night crossing the brook Kidron into thegarden; it is he who, relating the last triumphal entry into Jerusalem, spec-ies ‘the branches o the palm trees’ (the other evangelists use general ex-pressions, ‘boughs o the trees,’ or the like), ‘the palm trees’ on which he hadso ofen gazed, o which the sight was still so resh in his memory, whichclothed the eastern slopes o Olivet, and gave its name to the village oBethany, ‘the house o dates.’ How simple and natural the denite articles areon the lips o an eye-witness I need not say. How awkward they sound tolater ears, and how little likely to have been used by a later writer, un amiliarwith the scene itsel , we may in er rom the act that in our own version theyare suppressed, and the evangelist is made to say, ‘they took branches opalm trees.’

Moreover the amiliarity o the Fourth Evangelist, not only with the siteand the buildings o the temple, but also with the history, appears in astriking way rom a casual allusion. Afer the description o the cleansing othe temple by our Lord—a description which though brie is given withsingular vividness o detail—the Jews ask or some sign, as the credential

8“Bethsaida” or “Bethzatha” should probably be read in St. John : rather than “Bethesda.”





which might justi y this assumption o authority and right o chastisement.His answer is, ‘Pull down this temple, and in three days I will build it up.’

Teir astonishment is expressed in their reply, ‘Tis temple has been orty-six years in building, and will you raise it again in three days?’ ( : , ).Now I think it will be allowed that this mention o time is quite undesigned.It has no appearance o artice, it occurs naturally in the course o conver-sation, and it is altogether ree rom suspicion, as having been introducedto give a historical coloring to a work o ction. I so, let us examine itshistorical bearing.

For this purpose it is necessary to ollow two distinct lines o chrono-logical research. We have to investigate the history o the building o theHerodian temple, and we have to ascertain the dates o our Lord’s li e. Nowby comparison o several passages in Josephus, and by the exercise o his-torical criticism upon them, we arrive at the conclusion that Herod com-menced his temple about A.U.C. , i.e. . . It took many years inbuilding, and was not nally completed until A.U.C. , i.e. . . . Tusthe works were going on during the whole o the period comprised in theNew estament history. I we add orty-six years to the date o its com-mencement (A.U.C. ) we are brought down to A.U.C. or , i.e. . .

or .Te chronology o Herod’s temple involves one considerable effort o his-

torical criticism. Te chronology o our Lord’s li e requires another. Into thisquestion however I need not enter into detail. It is sufficient to remind youthat the common date o the Christian era is now generally allowed to be alittle wide o the mark, and that our Lord’s birth actually took place three or

our years be ore this era. Te point to be observed here is, that St. Lukeplaces the baptism o our Lord in or about the feenth year o iberius,which comprised the interval between the autumn o and the autumn o

. Now the occurrence related by St. John took place, as we may in er romhis narrative, in the rst Passover afer the baptism; that is, according to St.Luke’s chronology probably at the Passover o . Tus we are brought tothe same date by ollowing two lines o chronology; and we arrive at the actthat orty-six years there or thereabouts had actually elapsed since the com-

9On which see pp. - in the commentary below.




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mencement o Herod’s building to this point in our Lord’s ministry. I amanxious not to speak with too great precision, because the acts do not allow

it. Te exact number might have been orty-ve or orty-seven years, orragments o years may be reckoned in or not in our calculation, and the

data are not sufficiently exact to determine the date to a nicety. But, afer allallowance made or this margin o uncertainty, the coincidence is suffi-ciently striking.

And now let us suppose the Gospel to have been written in the middle othe second century, and ask ourselves what strong improbabilities this hy-

pothesis involves. Te writer must rst have made himsel acquainted witha number o acts connected with the temple o Herod. He must not onlyhave known that the temple was commenced in a particular year, but alsothat it was still incomplete at the time o our Lord’s ministry. So ar as weknow, he could only have got these acts rom Josephus.

Even Josephus however does not state the actual date o the com-mencement o the temple. It requires some patient research to arrive at thisdate by a comparison o several passages. We have there ore to suppose, rst,that the orger o the Fourth Gospel went through an elaborate critical in-

vestigation or the sake o ascertaining the date. But, secondly, he must havemade himsel acquainted with the chronology o the Gospel history. At allevents, he must have ascertained the date o the commencement o ourLord’s ministry. Te most avorable supposition is, that he had be ore himthe Gospel o St. Luke, though he nowhere else betrays the slightest acquain-tance with this gospel. Here he would nd the date that he wanted, reckonedby the years o the Roman emperors. Tirdly, afer arriving at these two re-sults by separate processes, he must combine them; thus connecting thechronology o the Jewish kings with the chronology o the Roman emperors,the chronology o the temple erection with the chronology o our Lord’s li e.

When he has taken all these pains, and worked up the subject so elaborately,he drops in the notice that has given him so much trouble in an incidental andunobtrusive way. It has no direct bearing on his history; it does not sub-servethe purpose of his theology. It leads to nothing, proves nothing. Certainly theart of concealing art was never exercised in a more masterly way than here.

And yet this was an age which perpetrated the most crude and bungling forg-eries, and is denounced by modern criticism for its utter incapacity of criticism.





Nor, when we travel beyond the city and its suburbs, does the writer’sknowledge desert him. One instance must suffice, but it is, i I mistake not,

so convincing, that it may well serve in place o many. Te country o theSamaritans lay between Judaea and Galilee, so that a person journeying

rom the one region to the other, unless he were prepared to make a detour,must necessarily pass through it. Tis was the case with our Lord and HisApostles, as related in the ourth chapter. Te high-road rom Jerusalempasses through some very remarkable scenery. Te mountain ridges o Ebaland Gerizim run parallel to each other rom east to west, not many hundred

eet apart, thus inclosing a narrow valley between them. Eastward this valley opens out into a plain, a rare phenomenon in this country—‘onemass o corn unbroken by a boundary or hedge,’ as it is described by onewho has seen it.

Up the valley westward, shut in between these mountain barriers, lies themodern town o Nablus, the ancient Shechem. Te road does not enter the

valley, but traverses the plain, running at right angles to the gorge, and thustouching the eastern bases o the mountain ridges as they all down into thelevel ground. Here at the mouth o the valley is a deep well, even now de-scending ‘to a depth o seventy eet or more,’ and ormerly, be ore it had beenpartially lled with accumulated rubbish, we may well believe deeper still.In the words o Dean Stanley:

O all the special localities o our Lord’s li e in Palestine, this is almost the onlyone absolutely undisputed. By the edge o this well, in the touching languageo the ancient hymn, ‘quaerens me sedisti lassus.’ Here on the great roadthrough which ‘He must needs go’ when ‘He lef Judaea, and departed intoGalilee,’ He halted, as travellers still halt, in the noon or evening o the springday by the side o the well. Up that passage through the valley His disciples‘went away into the city,’ which He did not enter. Down the same gorge camethe woman to draw water, according to the unchanged custom o the East. . . .Above them, as they talked, rose ‘this mountain’ o Gerizim, crowned by thetemple, o which vestiges still remain, where the athers o the Samaritan sect

‘said men ought to worship.’ . . . And round about them, as He and she thus sator stood by the well, spread ar and wide the noble plain o waving corn. It wasstill winter, or early spring, ‘ our months yet to the harvest,’ and the brightgolden ears o those elds had not yet ‘whitened’ their unbroken expanse o




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verdure. But as he gazed upon them, they served to suggest the glorious visiono the distant harvest o the Gentile world, which with each successive turn o

the conversation un olded itsel more and more distinctly be ore Him, as Hesat (so we gather rom the narrative) absorbed in the opening prospect, silentamidst His silent and astonished disciples.

Te scrupulous accuracy o the geographical and archaeological detailsin St. John’s account o the conversation with the Samaritan woman will haveappeared already rom this quotation. I will only ask you to consider or amoment how naturally they occur in the course o the narrative, so naturally

and so incidentally that without the researches o modern travellers the al-lusions would be entirely lost to us. I think that this consideration will leavebut one alternative. Either you have here written, as we are constantly re-minded, in an uncritical age and among an uncritical people, the most mas-terly piece o romance-writing which the genius and learning o man everpenned in any age; or you have (what universal tradition represents it to be)a genuine work o an eye-witness and companion o our Lord.Which of

these two suppositions does less violence to historical probability I will leave to yourselves to determine.Follow then the narrative in detail. An unknown raveller is sitting at the

well. His garb, or His eatures, or His destination, show Him to be a Jew. Awoman o the country comes to draw water rom the well, and He asks herto give Him to drink. She is surprised that He, a Jew, is willing to talk so

reely to her, a Samaritan. And here I would remark that the explanationwhich ollows, ‘For the Jews have no dealings with’ (or rather, ‘do not asso-ciate with’) ‘the Samaritans,’ is the evangelist’s own, a act obscured by theordinary mode o printing in our English Bibles. Hitherto, though the sceneis very natural and very real, there is nothing which a airly clever artistmight not have invented. But rom this point onwards ollow in rapid suc-cession various historical and geographical allusions, various hints o indi-

vidual character in the woman, various aspects o Divine teaching on ourLord’s part, all closely interwoven together, each suggesting and suggestedby another, in such a manner as to preclude any hypothesis o romance or

orgery. ‘Tou wouldest have asked, and I would have given thee living water.’‘Sir, Tou hast nothing to draw with, and the well is deep. . . . Art Tougreater than our ather Jacob?’ And so the conversation proceeds, one point





suggesting the next in the most natural way. ake, or instance, the re erenceto Gerizim. ‘Sir, I perceive that Tou art a prophet. Our athers worshipped

in this mountain.’ Observe that there is no mention in the context o anymountain in the neighborhood; that even here, where it is mentioned, itsname is not given, but suddenly the woman, partly to divert the inconve-nient tenor o the conversation, partly to satis y hersel on one importantpoint o difference between the Samaritans and the Jews, avails hersel o thenewly ound prophet’s presence, and, pointing to the over-hanging heightso Gerizim, puts the question to Him. Te mention o the sacred mountain,

like the mention o the depths o the well, draws orth a new spiritual lesson.‘Not in this mountain, nor yet at Jerusalem. . . . God is a spirit.’ Te womansays, ‘When Messiah comes. He will tell us all things.’ Jesus says, ‘I that speakunto thee am He.’

At this point the disciples approach rom the valley, with the provisionswhich they had purchased in the city, and rejoin their Master. Tey are sur-prised to nd Him so engaged. Here again an error in the English versionobscures the sense. Teir marvel was, not that He talked with the woman,but that He talked with a woman. It was a rabbinical maxim, ‘Let no mantalk with a woman in the street (in public), no, not with his own wi e.’ Tenarrowness o His disciples was shocked that He, their own rabbi, should beso wanting to Himsel as to disregard this recognized precept o morality.Te narrator assumes the knowledge with which he himsel was so amiliar.So the conversation with the woman closes. With natural eagerness sheleaves her pitcher, and hurries back to the city with her news. With naturalexaggeration she reports there that the stranger has told her all things thatever she did.

A conversation with the disciples ollows, which is hardly less remarkable,but rom which I must be content to select one illustration only. I think thatit must be allowed, that the re erence to the harvest is wholly ree rom sus-picion, as regards the manner o its introduction. It is unpremeditated, orit cannot be severed rom the previous part o the conversation, out o whichit arises. It is unobtrusive, or the passage itsel makes no attempt to explainthe local allusion (which without the experience o modern travellers wouldescape notice): ‘Tere are yet our months, and then cometh the harvest.Behold, I say unto you. Lif up your eyes, and look on the elds; or they are




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white already to harvest.’ And yet, when we once realize the scene, when inimagination our eye ranges over that vast expanse o growing corn—so un-

usual in Palestine, however amiliar in corn-growing England—we are atonce struck with the truth ulness and the signicance o this allusive parable.

I have thus endeavored to show, by taking a ew instances, the accuracyo the writer’s knowledge in all that relates to the history, the geography, theinstitutions, the thoughts and eelings o the Jews. I however we had oundaccuracy, and nothing more, we might indeed have reasonably in erred thatthe narrative was written by a Jew o the mother-country, who lived in a very

early age, be ore time and circumstance had obliterated the traces o Pal-estine, as it existed in the rst century; but we could not sa ely have gonebeyond this. But unless I have entirely deceived mysel , the manner in whichthis accurate knowledge betrays itsel justies the urther conclusion that wehave be ore us the genuine narrative o an eye-witness, who records theevents just as they occurred in natural sequence.

I have discussed the accuracy o the external allusions. Let me now applyanother test. Te representation o character is perhaps the most satis actorycriterion o a true narrative, as applied to an age be ore romance-writing hadbeen studied as an art. We are all amiliar with the principal characters inthe Gospel history: Peter, John, Philip, Tomas, Pilate, the sisters Mary andMartha, and several others which I might mention; each standing be ore uswith an individuality, that seems to place him or her within the range o ourown personal knowledge.

Have we ever asked ourselves to which evangelist above the rest we owethis personal acquaintance with the actors in this great drama? When thequestion is once asked, the answer cannot be doubt ul. It is true indeed thatwe should have known St. Peter without the narrative o the Fourth Evan-gelist, though he adds several minute points, which give additional li e tothe portrait. It is true that Pilate is introduced to us in the other Gospels,though without St. John we should not have been able to read his heart andcharacter, his proud Roman indifference and his cynical scorn. But, on theother hand, take the case o Tomas. O this Apostle nothing is recorded inthe other Evangelists, and yet he stands out be ore us, not as a mere lay gure,on whose stiff, mechanical orm the artist may hang a moral precept or adoctrinal lesson by way o drapery, but as a real, living, speaking man, at





once doubt ul and eager, at once hesitating and devoted—sceptical, not be-cause his nature is cold and unsympathetic, but because his intellect moves

more cautiously than his heart, because the momentous issues which belieinvolves bid him pause be ore he closes with it; at one moment endeavoringto divert his Master’s purpose o going up to Jerusalem, where certain de-struction awaits Him; at the next, ready to share the perils with Him, ‘Let usalso go with Him’; at one moment resisting the testimony o direct eye-witnesses and aith ul riends to his Master’s resurrection; at the next, over-whelmed by the evidence o his senses, and expressing the depth o his con-

viction in the earnest con ession ‘My Lord and my God.’I must satis y mysel with one other example. Te character o the sisters

Martha and Mary presents a striking contrast. Tey are mentioned once onlyin the other Gospels, in the amiliar passage o St. Luke, where they appearrespectively as the practical, bustling housewi e, who is busied about manythings, and the devout, contemplative, absorbed disciple, who chooses theone thing need ul. In St. John also this contrast reappears, but the charac-teristics o the two sisters are brought out in a very subtle way. In St. Lukethe contrast is summed up, as it were, in one denite incident; in St. John itis developed gradually in the course o a continuous narrative. And there isalso another difference. In St. Luke the contrast is direct and trenchant, acontrast (one might almost say) o light and darkness. But in St. John thecharacters are shaded off, as it were, into each other. Both alike are belovedby our Lord, both alike send to Him or help, both alike express their aithin His power, both alike show deep sorrow or their lost brother. And yet,notwithstanding this, the difference o character is perceptible throughoutthe narrative. It is Martha who, with her restless activity, goes out to meetJesus, while Mary remains in the house weeping. It is Martha who holds aconversation with Jesus, argues with Him, remonstrates with Him, and inthe very crisis o their grie shows her practical common sense in depre-cating the removal o the stone.

It is Mary who goes orth silently to meet Him, silently and tear ully, sothat the bystanders suppose her to be going to weep at her brother’s tomb;who, when she sees Jesus, alls down at His eet; who, uttering the samewords o aith in His power as Martha, does not quali y them with the samereservation; who in ects all the bystanders with the intensity o her sorrow,




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and crushes the human spirit o our Lord Himsel with sympathetic grie .And when we turn to the second occasion in which the two sisters are intro-

duced by St. John, the contrast is still the same. Martha is busied in thehomely duties o hospitality towards Jesus and her other guests; but Marybrings her choicest and most precious gif to bestow upon Him, at the sametime showing the depth o her humility and the abandonment o her de-

votion by wiping His eet with her hair.In all this narrative the Evangelist does not once direct attention to the

contrast between the two sisters. He simply relates the events o which he was

an eye-witness without a comment. But the two were real, living persons, andthere ore the difference o character between them develops itsel in action.

I have shown hitherto that, whatever touchstone we apply, the FourthGospel vindicates itsel as a trustworthy narrative, which could only haveproceeded rom a contemporary and an eye-witness. But nothing hashitherto been adduced which leads to the identication o the author as theApostle St. John. Tough sufficient has been said to vindicate the authen-ticity, the genuineness is yet untouched. It is said by those who deny its ap-ostolic origin, that the unknown author, living in the middle o the secondcentury, and wishing to gain a hearing or a modied gospel suited to thewants o his age, dropped his own personality and shielded himsel underthe name o St. John the son o Zebedee.

Is this a true representation o the act? Is it not an entire though un-conscious misrepresentation? John is not once mentioned by namethroughout the twenty-one chapters o this Gospel. James and John, thesons o Zebedee, occupy a prominent place in all the other Evangelists. Inthis Fourth Gospel alone neither brother’s name occurs. Te writer doesonce, it is true, speak o the ‘sons o Zebedee,’ but in this passage, whichoccurs in the last chapter ( : ), there is not even the aintest hint o anyconnection between the writer himsel and this pair o brothers. He men-tions them in the third person, as he might mention any character whomhe had occasion to introduce.

Now is not this wholly unlike the proceeding o a orger who was simu-lating a alse personality? Would it not be utterly irrational under thesecircumstances to make no provision or the identication o the author, butto leave everything to the chapter o accidents? No discredit, indeed, is





thrown on the genuineness o a document by the act that the author’s nameappears on the ore ront. Tis is the case with the histories o Herodotus and

Tucydides; it is the case also with the Epistles o Paul and Peter and James,and with the Apocalypse o John. But, on the supposition o orgery, it wasa matter o vital moment that the work should be accepted as the genuineproduction o its pretended author. Te two instances o early Christian

orgeries which I brought orward in an earlier part o this lecture will sufficeas illustrations.

Te Gospel of the Infancy closes with a distinct declaration that it was

written by James. Te Clementine Homilies affirm the pretended authorshipin the opening words, ‘I Clement, being a Roman citizen.’ Even i our sup-posed orger could have exercised this unusual sel -restraint in suppressingthe simulated author’s name, would he not have made it clear by some al-lusion to his brother James, or to his ather Zebedee, or to his motherSalome? Te policy which he has adopted is as suicidal as it is unexpected.

How then do we ascertain that it was written by John the son o Zebedee?I answer, rst o all, that it is traditionally ascribed to him, as thePhaedo isascribed to Plato, or the Antigone to Sophocles; and, secondly, that rom acare ul examination o indirect allusions and casual notices, rom a com-parison o things said and things unsaid, we arrive at the same result by aprocess independent o external tradition. But a orger could not have beensatised with trusting to either o these methods. External tradition wasquite beyond the reach o his control. In this particular case, as we shall see,the critical investigation requisite is so subtle, and its subject-matter lies so

ar below the sur ace, that a orger, even supposing him capable o con-structing the narrative, would have de eated his own purpose by makingsuch demands on his readers.

For let us ollow out this investigation. In the opening chapter o theGospel there is mention o a certain disciple whose name is not given ( : ,

, ). Tis anonymous person ( or it is a natural, though not a certain in-erence, that the same is meant throughout) reappears again in the closing

scene be ore and afer the passion, where he is distinguished as ‘the disciplewhom Jesus loved.’ At length, but not till the concluding verses o the Gospel,we are told that this anonymous disciple is himsel the writer: ‘Tis is thedisciple who testies o these things, and wrote these things.’




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In accordance with this statement we nd that those particular scenes inwhich this anonymous disciple is recorded as taking a part are related with

peculiar minuteness and vividness o detail. Such is the case, or instance,with the notices o the Baptist and o the call o the earliest disciples. Suchagain is the case with the conversation at the Last Supper, with the scene overthe re in the hall o Caiaphas’s house, with certain other incidents con-nected with the crucixion, and with the scene on the Lake o Galilee aferthe resurrection.

Who then is this anonymous disciple? On this point the Gospel urnishes

no in ormation. We arrive at the identication, partly by a process o ex-haustion, partly by attention to some casual incidents and expressions.Comparing the accounts in the other Gospels, it seems sa e to assume thathe was one o the inner circle o disciples. Tis inner circle comprised thetwo pairs o brothers, Peter and Andrew, James and John—i indeed Andrewdeserves a place here. Now he cannot have been Andrew, because Andrewappears in company with him in the opening chapter, nor can he have beenPeter, because we nd him repeatedly associated with Peter in the closingscenes. Again, James seems to be excluded; or James ell an early martyr,and external and internal evidence alike point to a later date or this Gospel.Tus by a process o exhaustion we are brought to identi y him with Johnthe son o Zebedee.

With this identication all the particulars agree. First—He is calledamong the earliest disciples; and rom his connection with Andrew ( : ,

) it may be in erred that he was a native o Bethsaida in the neighborhood.Secondly—At the close o his Master’s li e, and afer his Master’s resur-rection, we nd him especially associated with Simon Peter. Tis positionexactly suits John, who in the earliest days o the Church takes his place bythe side o Peter in the championship o aith. Tirdly—Unless the beloveddisciple be John the son o Zebedee, this person who occupies so prominenta place in the account o the other Evangelists, and who stood in the oremostrank in the estimation o the early Church as a pillar Apostle, does not onceappear in the Fourth Gospel, except in the one passage where ‘the sons oZebedee’ are mentioned and summarily dismissed in a mere enumerationo names. Such a result is hardly credible. Lastly—Whereas in the otherEvangelists John the Baptist is very requently distinguished by the addition





o this surname, and always so distinguished where there is any possibilityo con using him with the son o Zebedee, in this Gospel alone the ore-

runner is never once called John the Baptist. o others some distinguishingepithet seemed needed. o the son o Zebedee there was only one amousJohn; and there ore when he had occasion to mention him, he naturallyspoke o him as John simply, without any addition. Is it conceivable, I wouldask, that any orger would have lost sight o himsel so completely, and usednatural language o John the son o Zebedee with such success, as to observethis very minute and unobtrusive indication o personality?

I have addressed mysel more directly to the theory o the übingenschool, either as propounded by Baur, or as modied by later critics, whichdenies at once the historical character o this Gospel and its apostolic au-thorship, and places it in the middle or latter hal o the second century. Butthere is an intermediate position between rejecting its worth as a historicrecord and accepting St. John as its author, and this position has been takenup by some. Tey suppose it to have been composed by some disciple ordisciples o St. John rom reminiscences o their master’s teaching, and thusthey are prepared to allow that it contains some historical matter which is

valuable. You will have seen however that most o the arguments adduced,though not all, are equally atal to this hypothesis as the other. Te processby which, afer establishing its authenticity, we succeeded in identi ying itsauthor is, i I mistake not, alone sufficient to overthrow this solution. Indeedthis theory is exposed to a double set o objections, and it has nothing torecommend it. I have already taken up more time than I had intended, andyet I eel that very much has been lef unsaid. But I venture to hope thatcertain lines o investigation have been indicated, which, i care ully andsoberly ollowed out, can only lead to one result. Whatever consequencesmay ollow rom it, we are compelled on critical grounds to accept thisFourth Gospel as the genuine work o John the son o Zebedee.

Some among my hearers perhaps may be disappointed that I have nottouched on some well-known difficulties, though these have been grosslyexaggerated. Some have to be satis actorily explained; o others probable,or at least possible, solutions have been given; while others still remain onwhich we are obliged to suspend judgment until some new light o historyis vouchsa ed.It is not from too much light, but from too little light, that the




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historical credibility of this Gospel has suffered. Each new discovery made,each old act elucidated, sets at rest some disputed question. I the main

act o the genuineness be established, the special difficulties can wellafford to wait.

One word more, and I conclude. I have treated this as a purely criticalquestion, care ully eschewing any appeal to Christian instincts. As a criticalquestion I wish to take a verdict upon it. But as I could not have you thinkthat I am blind to the theological issues directly or indirectly connected withit, I will close with this brie con ession o aith: I believe rom my heart that

the truth which this Gospel more especially enshrines—the truth that JesusChrist is the very Word Incarnate, the mani estation o the Father tomankind—is the one lesson which, duly apprehended, will do more than allour eeble efforts to puri y and elevate human li e here by imparting to ithope and light and strength, the one study which alone can tly prepare us

or a joy ul immortality hereafer. [ ]

T C O L ’ L

[In addition to the remarks above, it is necessary to say something about therather different chronology o Jesus’ li e one nds in St. John, when com-pared to the Synoptics, not least because o its bearing on the historicaltrustworthiness o the Fourth Gospel.] In three respects, the Fourth Gospelcan be contrasted with the Synoptic portrait o Jesus when it comes tomatters o chronology and history: ) the scene o the ministry; ) the char-acterization o the preaching; and ) the duration o the ministry. Te chro-nology o the ministry is derived wholly rom St. John himsel (i.e. not romthe Synoptics). One must take into account the writer, the scenes, and thepersons or whom the narrative is written.

Tere are at least three passages which help us at this juncture: ) : ;) : ; ) : , and possibly : . Te upshot o close scrutiny o such passages

is that they suggest that Jesus’ ministry involved the great part o three years,or at least more than two. What we know rom St. Luke ( : ) is that the

10See now the excursus by Light oot on this on pp. - below.11Tis transitional sentence is my own, based on numerous comments by Light oot elsewhere (see

below, e.g., in appendix A), in order or what ollows to comport with and t with what has comebe ore. (BW )





ministry began in the feenth year o iberius—A.U.C. or thus, in. . or . How much longer it went beyond two years is impossible to

say, the uttermost limit o course being the end o Pilate’s rule in Judaea in. . , coincident with the accession o Gaius. iberius died in March o

A.U.C. ( . . ). As or our Lord’s age when he began the ministry wehave the notice in Luke : —about thirty.

As or the structure o this Gospel, afer the Prologue on the Logos, there are two great parts: ) the description o the ministry climaxing with‘the conspiracy o the Jews’ in : - , and ) ollowed in John ff. the

history o the Paschal week, the death, the resurrection, the appearances.We must ocus on the crucial juncture in the narrative in John , and aska crucial question.

In more detail we have to ask and answer where do most o the Galileanevents reported in the Synoptics t in? I am disposed to think they t im-mediately afer John : . I must emphasize the importance o this epoch.When the Evangelist says in a very general way ‘and he went about inGalilee’ it seems reasonable that it would be here that we must place mosto the Synoptic events. Tere were a considerable number o events be-tween Jesus’ second and third visits to Jerusalem. As or the ministry atJerusalem and the neighborhood, we have a gap between : and : . It isunlikely that a third visit to Jerusalem ollowed hard upon the second oneespecially since : says the Jewish authorities were looking or an oppor-tunity to kill him, and so ‘instead’ o returning to Jerusalem at that time,he went about in Galilee.

So what o the ministry in Jerusalem between the second and third visits?We have: ) the visit to Jerusalem during the Feast o the abernacles ( ishri—October) as reported John : - —the con rontation with the brothers, buthe does in due course go up to Jerusalem; ) : - —teaching and conver-sation in the emple during the latter days o the Festival; ) : - must beomitted; ) : – : —preaching on ‘the Great Day’ o the Festival (dayeight) near the emple treasury on two topics: ) the water : ; ) the light

: ; ) : - —other conversations. Tis then leads to . . .

: – : —the healing o the blind man on the Sabbath day with the ensuingdiscourse on the door and the sheep old.




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: - —Jesus at Jerusalem at the Feast o Dedication (December), teachingat the Porch o Solomon.

: - —He returns beyond the Jordan.

1) Te th chapter as a whole—Jesus at Bethany, the raising o Lazarus

: - —the conspiracy o the ‘Jews’


The Gospel of St. John By J. B. Lightfoot - EXCERPT

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Transcript of The Gospel of St. John By J. B. Lightfoot - EXCERPT