The Gospel of John’s Jewish-Christian Source

How to cite this article: David Flusser, “The Gospel of John’s Jewish-Christian Source,” Jerusalem Perspective (2015) [https://www.jerusalemperspective.com/13826/].

The anonymous author of the Fourth Gospel also composed the Johannine Epistles.^[32] According to church tradition, the author of the Fourth Gospel is identified as John, one of the twelve apostles whom Jesus appointed. The Fourth Gospel itself mentions Jesus’ beloved disciple who testifies to and explains the deeds of Jesus (John 21:24).^[33] Church tradition identifies John, the disciple and apostle of Jesus, as the beloved disciple and regards him as the author of the gospel that now bears John’s name. Without in-depth study of who the beloved disciple is, we may yet ask whether the author of the Fourth Gospel sought to be identified as the beloved disciple, who is always referred to in the third person, or whether the beloved disciple was merely the source of the ideas and perspective articulated by the author of the Fourth Gospel. Did the anonymous author make reference to the beloved disciple to indicate the source of his authority, making the Fourth Gospel some kind of anonymous pseudepigraphon? Or is the reference to the beloved disciple an allusion to some other kind of source that was the basis of the Fourth Gospel?

• ^[1] In the course of Rabbi Eliezer ben Hyrcanus' discussion with Jacob of Kefar Sekaniah, a disciple of Jesus, Jacob says, "In your Torah, it is written..." (b. Avod. Zar. 17^a; cf. Eccl. Rab. 1:8 §3). The question remains, however, whether this dissociative language is really that of Jesus' disciple, Jacob, or whether it is a secondary adaptation of his words. It is likely that this dissociative language ("your Torah") in rabbinic literature and the Fourth Gospel reflects the developing opinion of the rabbinic sages in the one case, and the author of the Fourth Gospel's understanding of the connection of Christianity to Judaism in the other. On the encounter between Rabbi Eliezer and Jacob of Kefar Sekaniah, see Ray Pritz, Nazarene Jewish Christianity (Jerusalem: Magnes, 1988), 96 ff.; Joshua Schwartz and Peter J. Tomson, "When Rabbi Eliezer Was Arrested For Heresy," Jewish Studies, an Internet Journal 10 (2012): 145-181--JNT. ↩
• ^[2] See Oscar Cullmann, Der Johanneische Kreis: Sein Platz im Spätjudentum, in der Jüngerschaft Jesu und im Urchristentum (Tübingen: Mohr [Siebeck], 1975). Cullmann connects the separation from mainstream Judaism to the type of Judaism adhered to in the Johannine community. His opinion is interesting, but he does not fully understand the question of fulfilling the commandments in Judaism. ↩
• ^[3] See above, note 1. ↩
• ^[4] It is possible that Irenaeus derived his testimony from Papias and that we should therefore regard their words as a single source. See Eusebius, Hist. Eccl. 3.39.4. ↩
• ^[5] On the shaky and exaggerated attempts to attribute greater historical accuracy to the Fourth Gospel, see Charles H. Dodd, Historical Tradition in the Fourth Gospel (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1963). ↩
• ^[6] See Rudolf Bultmann, The Gospel of John: A Commentary (trans. G. R. Beasley-Murray et al.; Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1971), 6-7, 113-114. ↩
• ^[7] Robert T. Fortna, The Gospel of Signs: A Reconstruction of the Narrative Source Underlying the Fourth Gospel (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1970). ↩
• ^[8] Fortna (Gospel of Signs, 2) defines the aporias as "the many inconsistencies, disjunctures and hard connections, even contradictions...notably in the narrative portions [of the Fourth Gospel]...which cannot be accounted for by textual criticism"--JNT. ↩
• ^[9] See Fortna, Gospel of Signs, 235-245--JNT. ↩
• ^[10] See Fortna, Gospel of Signs, 223-225--JNT. ↩
• ^[11] Cf. the story of Rabbi Yose ben Kisma in b. Sanh. 98^a. ↩
• ^[12] The Testimonium Flavianum is the scholarly term for the passage in Josephus that describes the life of Jesus (Ant. 18:63-64). Most scholars agree that this passage was edited by a later Christian copyist--JNT. See Shlomo Pines, An Arabic Version of the Testimonium Flavianum and its Implications (Jerusalem: Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1971); and my article, עדותו של יספוס על ישו, יהדות ומקורות הנצרות; מחקרים ומסות (תל אביב: ספרית פועלים ,תשל″ט) עמ′ 80-72. ↩
• ^[13] See Fortna, Gospel of Signs, 52 n. 2. ↩
• ^[14] See my article, היחס הספרותי בין שלושת האוונגליונים, יהדות ומקורות הנצרות; מחקרים ומסות (תל אביב: ספרית פועלים ,תשל″ט) עמ′ 49-28. ↩
• ^[15] Biblical quotations are according to the RSV--JNT. ↩
• ^[16] Cf. Fortna, Gospel of Signs, 115, 146 n. 1--JNT. ↩
• ^[17] A hadith is tradition about Muhammed that is not part of the Koran. The collections of hadiths were compiled long after the death of the founder of Islam. See Gordon D. Newby, A Concise Encyclopedia of Islam (Oxford: Oneworld, 2002), 69-70--JNT. ↩
• ^[18] See Shlomo Pines, “The Jewish Christians of the Early Centuries According to a New Source,” Proceedings of the Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities 2 (1968): 4, 10. Stern, who disagrees with Pines' interpretation of the text, provides a complete translation of the Arabic source that Pines examined in his essay. See Samuel M. Stern, "'Abd Al-Jabbar's Account of how Christ's Religion was Falsified by the Adoption of Roman Customs," Journal of Theological Studies 19.1 (1968): 128-185. See also, John G. Gager, "Did Jewish Christians See the Rise of Islam?" in The Ways That Never Parted: Jews and Christians in Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages (ed. Adam H. Becker and Annette Yoshiko Reed; Minneapolis: Fortress, 2007), 361-372--JNT. ↩
• ^[19] Cf. the Minor Tractate “Kuthim” 2:13 [61^b]--JNT. ↩
• ^[20] Fortna includes John 4:6-26 in his reconstruction, but in his discussion he does not agree with me to include John 4:20, 22. See Fortna, Gospel of Signs, 189-195--JNT. ↩
• ^[21] See Shlomo Pines, “The Jewish Christians of the Early Centuries According to a New Source,” 4, 10. ↩
• ^[22] Flusser’s translation--JNT. ↩
• ^[23] See above, note 14. ↩
• ^[24] Contrast the negative connotation of “Jews” in John 11:8 with the favorable connotation in John 11:19, 31, 33, 36. See Raymond E. Brown, The Gospel According to John (2 vols.; Anchor Bible 29 and 29a; Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1966, 1970), 1:427-428. ↩
• ^[25] Flusser's translation--JNT. ↩
• ^[26] See Shlomo Pines, “The Jewish Christians of the Early Centuries According to a New Source,” 61; idem, “Gospel Quotations and Cognate Topics in ‘Abd Al-Jabbar’s Tathbit in Relation to Early Christian and Judaeo-Christian Readings and Traditions,” Jerusalem Studies in Arabic and Islam 9 (1987): 195-278, esp. 214. ↩
• ^[27] Flusser's translation—JNT. ↩
• ^[28] See my article, משפטו ומותו של ישו הנוצרי, יהדות ומקורות הנצרות; מחקרים ומסות (תל אביב: ספרית פועלים ,תשל″ט) עמ′ 149-120‎. ↩
• ^[29] See שמואל ספראי, עליה לרגל בימי בית שני (תל אביב: עם הספר, 1966)‏; Shmuel Safrai, Die Wallfahrt im Zeitalter des Zweiten Tempels (trans. Dafna Mach; Neukirchen-Vluyn: Neukirchener Verlag, 1981), 158. ↩
• ^[30] See David Flusser, Jesus (3d ed.; Jerusalem: Magnes, 2001), 134-135 n. 2--JNT. ↩
• ^[31] The translator wishes to thank Lauren S. Asperschlager for carefully proofreading the final version of this article and for her many helpful comments and suggestions along the way--JNT. ↩
• ^[32] Already among the early church fathers there were those who believed that the author of the Fourth Gospel wrote only the First Epistle of John. See Raymond E. Brown, The Epistles of John (Anchor Bible 30; Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1982), 9-13–JNT. ↩
• ^[33] Various scholars have questioned the authenticity of the final chapter of the Fourth Gospel, which summarizes the entire work, and this problem has not yet received a satisfying solution. ↩