The Disciple Whom Jesus Loved

[Vouthon]

Who do you think was the “disciple whom Jesus loved”?

I know that traditionally this is viewed as John the Apostle, however I no longer believe this to be the case.

After doing a lot of study into the subject, I’ve come to a few (personal) conclusions:

1. The Beloved Disciple is of an upper class, priestly family
2. The Beloved Disciple is Judean and not Galilean
3. The Beloved Disciple was known by the High Priest
4. The Beloved Disciple was most likely a member of the Beloved Bethany Family (ie Lazarus, Martha or Mary)
5. I believe this family too be the very same aristocratic, priestly family known in the Jewish Talmud as the “Ben Boethus Family”. This consisted of an Eleazer (Lazarus) who had been High Priest in about the year 4-3 BC, a Martha and a Mary who were both considered to be the wealthiest women in First Century Judea. Mary was remembered in the Talmud as a vain, beautiful young woman who had long, pretty hair which she braided.
6. I believe that the identity of the Beloved Disciple was concealed in the Gospel of John primarily for reasons of safety. The Boethus were too prominent to be signalled out as Jesus’ “beloved family”, particularly since Eleazer (Lazarus) had been risen from the dead by Jesus and was nearly himself executed by the Jewish Hierarchy (spared only because of his prestige and authority in Second Temple Judaism).
7. John, the author of the final copy of the Gospel of John and its redactor, was the son of Martha and her first husband. He is remebered in Jewish tradition as a young Priest who used to carry the sacred vessels into the Jewish Temple. In Christian tradition he was known as John the Presbyter, a young priest who wore the “petalon” - a metaphorical reference to his High Priestly heritage. He was the designated successor of the Johannine Community, which under him split into the Orthodox Johannine Community under his leadership which was part of the Catholic Church, and the Secessionists under the heretic Cerinthus, who challenged John the Presybter’s authority and became the first Gnostics later known as the Naassenes.
8. In the Letter of 2 John, the “elect lady” and her “elect sister” mentioned respectfully by John the Presbyter in this epistle are not Churches but the two sisters Martha and Mary, called “Elect” because of their prominence in the Beloved Bethany Family.
9. The Beloved Disciple penned the original copy of the Gospel of John, which was later redacted and edited by Presbyter John, who brought it to its final canonical state. He wrote 2 John and 3 John, whereas 1 John came from the reflections of the Beloved Disciple.

I welcome anyone to challange this idea and when I have time I will show why I believe it to be the truth.

Its is my FIRM conviction that the original copy of the Gospel of John did not come from the pen or even the memoirs of St John the Apostle, a Galilean fisherman.

 

[puzzleannie]

there is no evidence whatever to support the links and assumptions you make in this theory

your beliefs and mine are irrelevant. What does scripture and other reliable sources support? You have cited no support whatever other than unsubstantiated assumptions.

You have taken a couple of kernels of truth, such as the probability that the author of John’s gospel was know to the high priest, and fabricated a theory made of cobwebs.

 

[Vouthon]

there is no evidence whatever to support the links and assumptions you make in this theory

your beliefs and mine are irrelevant. What does scripture and other reliable sources support? You have cited no support whatever other than unsubstantiated assumptions.

You have taken a couple of kernels of truth, such as the probability that the author of John’s gospel was know to the high priest, and fabricated a theory made of cobwebs.

Dearest Puzzle

Thank you for your reply! You are fully entitled to hold this opinion, which I respect.

Nonetheless I have not yet presented the evidence to back up this theory. I plan on posting it a bit at a time, starting from tonight or tommorrow. Once I have explained myself a little, then you are at liberty to say that I’m an idiot who is voicing complete tosh or whatever else you believe

However I think that I at least deserve a chance to back up my “assumptions” with some evidence that has brought me to these assumptions, and some scholars who have guided me towards this belief.

I will demonstrate why I believe this both from the Gospel itself, early witnesses from the second century and modern biblical scholars who have espoused either this opinion or one very similar to it (at least in part).

After that if you consider me a complete idiot, then I have no probs with that!

Or you can just ignore me all together and adhere to your belief that this is all “cobwebs”. I’m happy with that too (since I expected it when I made this thread).

However I respect your opinion Cobwebs and all

May God Bless you

 

[Pfaffenhoffen]

Who do you think was the “disciple whom Jesus loved”?

I know that traditionally this is viewed as John the Apostle, however I no longer believe this to be the case.

After doing a lot of study into the subject, I’ve come to a few (personal) conclusions:

1. The Beloved Disciple is of an upper class, priestly family
2. The Beloved Disciple is Judean and not Galilean
3. The Beloved Disciple was known by the High Priest
4. The Beloved Disciple was most likely a member of the Beloved Bethany Family (ie Lazarus, Martha or Mary)
5. I believe this family too be the very same aristocratic, priestly family known in the Jewish Talmud as the “Ben Boethus Family”. This consisted of an Eleazer (Lazarus) who had been High Priest in about the year 4-3 BC, a Martha and a Mary who were both considered to be the wealthiest women in First Century Judea. Mary was remembered in the Talmud as a vain, beautiful young woman who had long, pretty hair which she braided.
6. I believe that the identity of the Beloved Disciple was concealed in the Gospel of John primarily for reasons of safety. The Boethus were too prominent to be signalled out as Jesus’ “beloved family”, particularly since Eleazer (Lazarus) had been risen from the dead by Jesus and was nearly himself executed by the Jewish Hierarchy (spared only because of his prestige and authority in Second Temple Judaism).
7. John, the author of the final copy of the Gospel of John and its redactor, was the son of Martha and her first husband. He is remebered in Jewish tradition as a young Priest who used to carry the sacred vessels into the Jewish Temple. In Christian tradition he was known as John the Presbyter, a young priest who wore the “petalon” - a metaphorical reference to his High Priestly heritage. He was the designated successor of the Johannine Community, which under him split into the Orthodox Johannine Community under his leadership which was part of the Catholic Church, and the Secessionists under the heretic Cerinthus, who challenged John the Presybter’s authority and became the first Gnostics later known as the Naassenes.
8. In the Letter of 2 John, the “elect lady” and her “elect sister” mentioned respectfully by John the Presbyter in this epistle are not Churches but the two sisters Martha and Mary, called “Elect” because of their prominence in the Beloved Bethany Family.
9. The Beloved Disciple penned the original copy of the Gospel of John, which was later redacted and edited by Presbyter John, who brought it to its final canonical state. He wrote 2 John and 3 John, whereas 1 John came from the reflections of the Beloved Disciple.

I welcome anyone to challange this idea and when I have time I will show why I believe it to be the truth.

Its is my FIRM conviction that the original copy of the Gospel of John did not come from the pen or even the memoirs of St John the Apostle, a Galilean fisherman.

I think you are seeing too much…

 

[adstrinity]

The Catholic Church says it is John, therefore it is John.

 

[Vouthon]

The Catholic Church says it is John, therefore it is John.

Actually the belief that it is the Apostle John is not Sacred Tradition but “tradition”, in that it is in no way doctrinal/dogmatic/binding upon anybody to believe it is John.

The Catholic ‘Church’ has never decalred that John the Apostle wrote this Gospel. Some early Witnesses did claim this, and this opinion became the mainstream view as to its origin, however it is no way binding.

 

[Vouthon]

I think you are seeing too much…

I understand

When I have the time (I am currently sifting through great mounds of paper-work and study texts for my upcoming law examinations) I hope to try and at least present my view as “possible”, even if you and the others still consider it not to be in any way “plausible”.

I aim to show that there is growing recognition of the Judean provenance and character of this Gospel on the part of scholars; the problem with the traditional ascription of this Gospel to John of Zebedee, taking into account much of the evidence collected by the likes of Richard Bauckman and Ben Worthington on the significance of the fragments attributed to Papias and reflected on later by Eusebius; and the Ben Boethus/Bethany Family hypothesis championed most recently and with such prodigious scholarly skill by Frederick Baltz amidst many other scholars and factors.

I apologize if I appear to be adding 2 + 2 and coming up with 10,000

 

[Vouthon]

I will (even though I am hard pressed for time atm) leave you with three brief (and not deeply elucidated or scrutinized) thoughts on the tradition that John the Apostle is the author, these being:

1. In Acts 4:13 we read that when Annas, Caiaphas and the Pharisees “saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were unlearned and ignorant men. They marveled, and they took knowledge of them, that they had been with Jesus”. I believe this to be important when considering John’s authorship of the Johannine Gospel and Letters. While I understand that he might have had someone proficient in Greek to help him write it (ie as some think of Peter with Silvanus) I really do think that the very learned theology, to my mind profoundly rooted in the priestly (Temple) form of Judaism in the first century and underlined by the prominence of the Judean Festivals, does not really match up well with John the apostle - and by this I do not discredit him or limit the work of the Holy Spirit upon him. Before Pentecost, the High Priest Caiaphas didn’t even know who John was. ‘Unlearned’ in Greek literally says ‘unlettered.’ It literally means illiterate. John was not a literary type, possibly he could not write at all. Yet the books (gospel) and 3 epistles ascribed to him are some of the best Greek literature we have from the first century. If John is an unlettered and uneducated fisherman, like Peter and most of the other Galileans,then it does not make any sense to me and indeed seems to stretch credulity that he could be believed to have written the Fourth Gospel, unless God is seen as having supersceded his personality and cultural background altogether. That isn’t a very scholarly approach to me, and I don’t think its at all plausible, since God clearly makes use of a wide variety of different social backgrounds, personal experiences, talents and cultural/theological influences when he inspired the sacred authors of the Old and New Testaments. I presume that in view of this John the Apostle’s Galilean heritage and social/cultural (or even religious) influences would be revealed in and be present within his writings.
2. None, and I do stress none, of the very particular group of ‘Zebedee brothers’ stories are included in the Fourth Gospel (e.g. the calling of the Zebedees by Jesus, their presence with Jesus when they witnessed the raising of the daughter of Jairus, the Transfiguration scene, and also of the special request for special seats in Jesus’ kingdom when it comes etc). If this were John’s Gospel, I would probably expect to see clear imprints of his own personal experiences of Jesus. However there are really none. Instead the Synoptic tradition seems to show forth more experience taken directly from the thought of John the apostle, than does the Fourth Gospel.This is especially important, when it is considered that this Gospel places great stress on the crucial role of eyewitness testimony (see especially Jn. 19-21). Is it not really strange that these stories would be omitted if this Gospel was by John of Zebedee, or even if he was its primary source? It is equally strange that the Zebedees are so briefly mentioned in this Gospel as such (see Jn. 21.2) and John is never equated with the Beloved Disciple even in the appendix in John 21 (cf. vs. 2 and 7-- the Beloved Disciple could certainly be one of the two unnamed disciples mentioned in vs. 2).
3. The Fourth Gospel incorporates basically none (well almost none I admit) of the Galilean miracle stories found in the Synoptics with the obvious exception to this rule being the feeding of the 5,000 and Jesus’ walk on the water. The Gospel rather incorporates stories like the meeting with Nicodemus, the encounter with the Samaritan woman, the healing of the blind man, the healing of the cripple by the pool, and the raising of Lazarus. What do all of these scenes have in common? Well, none of them took place in Galilee. Not a bit strange for a Galilean? To my mind, the eyewitness behind the Fourth Gospel, when we see this in tandem with the fact that our beloved disciple seems to have some pretty detailed knowledge regarding the topography in and around Jerusalem and the historical particulars about the last week or so of Jesus’ life, I feel it is not an exaggeration of the evidence to suggest that this Gospel comes from the mind of a Judean rather than of a Galiliean.

Just a thought

I apologize again if I appear to be adding 2 + 2 and coming up with 10,000

 

[ItIsWritten]

I welcome anyone to challange this idea…

You say “this idea” but you state many ideas, some which are in line with the text of scripture and some which are not justified by anything said by the God-inspired writers of scripture. You have clearly sought to do a thorough biblical analysis of this topic and are willing to subject man-made tradition to biblical scrutiny. So, rather than engage in a long-winded exchange on this thread, I think it would be a better idea to just direct you to some biblical evidence on this topic which you may want to consider.

TheDiscipleWhomJesusLoved.com has a free eBook which presents the biblical evidence on this topic in a way which encourages Bible students to take seriously the biblical admonition, “prove all things” and to heed the many biblical warnings like, “It is better to trust in the Lord than to put confidence in man.”

It quotes nothing but scripture in order to help those who have a love of the truth to focus on facts found in the plain text of scripture that are often overlooked when the authority of God’s word is put in subjection to the traditions of men which make void the word of God.

I hope it helps in your efforts to align your thinking with the record of the God-inspired writers of scripture, not only on this topic but on any matter where the ideas of men are in conflict with the facts in the plain text of scripture.

 

[Big_Ro]

This is all very interesting Vouthon. I do, however, agree with puzzleannie that you seem to be extrapolating conclusions from thin evidence. I will also admit that your arguments, thus far, are somewhat compelling, but altogether superficial and circumstantial. I will keep an open mind and look forward to the rest of your argument.

BTW, I do like your signature. Are you familiar with Memetic Theory?

 

[adstrinity]

The Catholic Church says it’s John, therefore it’s John.

 

[Nelka]

The Catholic Church says it is John, therefore it is John.

The Catholic Church says it’s John, therefore it’s John.

 

[thistle]

The Catholic Church says it is John.

cuf.org/FileDownloads/john.pdf

 

[steve53]

The original poster is on to something.
Hagan covers this in “Roman Fires” quite nicely.
Basically, there are several “mystery” figures in NT that, if you have a firm grasp on Jewish and Roman history of the times, you can link together. Taking it to speculative extremes, one can say that the beloved Disciple (indeed a former Temple Priest of wealth and influence) accompanied Nicodemus when he talked to John the Baptist as a young man, was the owner of the house of the Last Supper and where the disciples stayed after the crucifixion, was the man whom followed Jesus to the Caiaphas compound, and let Peter into the enclave, and later wrote the Gospel of John. He could have also brokered the temporary truce that let Caiaphas allow Jesus to preach in the temple in the months leading up to his crucifixion.
He was later known as John the Evangelist, and died during the reign of Trajan, which would have put him in his nineties, which was not common, but not unheard of in those days, especially among ascetic religious types.
An extraordinary life, if true!

 

[puzzleannie]

Dearest Puzzle

Thank you for your reply! You are fully entitled to hold this opinion, which I respect.

I don’t have an opinion, I don’t need one, and am not qualified to form one, only the Catholic Church can do that, and since I rely on her, not my own unaided intellect, I don’t need to be burdened with useless theories of my own devising. But if I did make some claim to scripture scholarship you can make darn sure I would be citing authorotative sources right and left, not my own musings and imaginings.

 

[benedictus2]

Who do you think was the “disciple whom Jesus loved”?

I know that traditionally this is viewed as John the Apostle, however I no longer believe this to be the case.

After doing a lot of study into the subject, I’ve come to a few (personal) conclusions:

1. The Beloved Disciple is of an upper class, priestly family
2. The Beloved Disciple is Judean and not Galilean
3. The Beloved Disciple was known by the High Priest
4. The Beloved Disciple was most likely a member of the Beloved Bethany Family (ie Lazarus, Martha or Mary)
5. I believe this family too be the very same aristocratic, priestly family known in the Jewish Talmud as the “Ben Boethus Family”. This consisted of an Eleazer (Lazarus) who had been High Priest in about the year 4-3 BC, a Martha and a Mary who were both considered to be the wealthiest women in First Century Judea. Mary was remembered in the Talmud as a vain, beautiful young woman who had long, pretty hair which she braided.
6. I believe that the identity of the Beloved Disciple was concealed in the Gospel of John primarily for reasons of safety. The Boethus were too prominent to be signalled out as Jesus’ “beloved family”, particularly since Eleazer (Lazarus) had been risen from the dead by Jesus and was nearly himself executed by the Jewish Hierarchy (spared only because of his prestige and authority in Second Temple Judaism).
7. John, the author of the final copy of the Gospel of John and its redactor, was the son of Martha and her first husband. He is remebered in Jewish tradition as a young Priest who used to carry the sacred vessels into the Jewish Temple. In Christian tradition he was known as John the Presbyter, a young priest who wore the “petalon” - a metaphorical reference to his High Priestly heritage. He was the designated successor of the Johannine Community, which under him split into the Orthodox Johannine Community under his leadership which was part of the Catholic Church, and the Secessionists under the heretic Cerinthus, who challenged John the Presybter’s authority and became the first Gnostics later known as the Naassenes.
8. In the Letter of 2 John, the “elect lady” and her “elect sister” mentioned respectfully by John the Presbyter in this epistle are not Churches but the two sisters Martha and Mary, called “Elect” because of their prominence in the Beloved Bethany Family.
9. The Beloved Disciple penned the original copy of the Gospel of John, which was later redacted and edited by Presbyter John, who brought it to its final canonical state. He wrote 2 John and 3 John, whereas 1 John came from the reflections of the Beloved Disciple.

I welcome anyone to challange this idea and when I have time I will show why I believe it to be the truth.

Its is my FIRM conviction that the original copy of the Gospel of John did not come from the pen or even the memoirs of St John the Apostle, a Galilean fisherman.

At the Last Supper, only the 12 were present. If you say that the Beloved Disciple was not a Gallilean then it must be Judas because I think it is only Judas who was not a Gallilean but Judean.

Ergo the disciple that Jesus loved was Judas Iscariot .

You seem to be hinting at someone outside of the twelve.

But the beloved disciple was at the last supper so it could have only been one of them.

As for the Apostle John not having written the last Gospel here is a commentary from the Jerusalem Bible:

Ancient Tradition associates the gospel with John the Apostle, but modern studies show that a complex process of development occurred either from a primitive core or form several separate sources. Such a development , through a group of John’s disciples in the latter half of the first century, would account for numerous repetitions and overlaps, the result of a determination to lose nothing of the tradition of the teaching of the Beloved Disciple.

 

[TrueLight]

This is interesting,OP.

I would love to see some of the wonderful, amateur apologists on this forum engage the OP instead of some, not all, shutting him down with “the church says it is so and that’s that.”

It’s important to know what you believe and why you believe it so that you can witness to the world and defend your faith. That is what apologetics is about.

Hopefully after mass, some of our excellent apologists will chime in.

 

[patrick457]

At the Last Supper, only the 12 were present. If you say that the Beloved Disciple was not a Gallilean then it must be Judas because I think it is only Judas who was not a Gallilean but Judean.

Ergo the disciple that Jesus loved was Judas Iscariot .

There is in fact a theory that exists which proposes exactly this. After all, the “other disciple” was well known to the high priest (John 18:15)…

 

[patrick457]

I1) In Acts 4:13 we read that when Annas, Caiaphas and the Pharisees “saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were unlearned and ignorant men. They marveled, and they took knowledge of them, that they had been with Jesus”. I believe this to be important when considering John’s authorship of the Johannine Gospel and Letters. While I understand that he might have had someone proficient in Greek to help him write it (ie as some think of Peter with Silvanus) I really do think that the very learned theology, to my mind profoundly rooted in the priestly (Temple) form of Judaism in the first century and underlined by the prominence of the Judean Festivals, does not really match up well with John the apostle - and by this I do not discredit him or limit the work of the Holy Spirit upon him. Before Pentecost, the High Priest Caiaphas didn’t even know who John was. ‘Unlearned’ in Greek literally says ‘unlettered.’ It literally means illiterate. John was not a literary type, possibly he could not write at all. Yet the books (gospel) and 3 epistles ascribed to him are some of the best Greek literature we have from the first century. If John is an unlettered and uneducated fisherman, like Peter and most of the other Galileans,then it does not make any sense to me and indeed seems to stretch credulity that he could be believed to have written the Fourth Gospel, unless God is seen as having supersceded his personality and cultural background altogether. That isn’t a very scholarly approach to me, and I don’t think its at all plausible, since God clearly makes use of a wide variety of different social backgrounds, personal experiences, talents and cultural/theological influences when he inspired the sacred authors of the Old and New Testaments. I presume that in view of this John the Apostle’s Galilean heritage and social/cultural (or even religious) influences would be revealed in and be present within his writings.

Let me answer this first.

Acts 4:13 does say that Peter and John are agrammatoi “unlettered,” but rather than taking this comment at face value (they are literally illiterate), it is equally likely that “unlettered” just meant, as the second translation says, ‘uneducated’, in the sense that these men did not have technical training in the professional schools. In context, the council would not have immediately known from the brief verbal exchange whether these men could read or write, nor was that the focus of their amazement. The source of their amazement rather is that they, who were not formally trained teachers, could hold their own in argument with some of the experts of the nation.

And it came to pass upon the morrow, there were gathered together of them the rulers, and elders, and scribes, to Jerusalem, and Annas the chief priest, and Caiaphas, and John, and Alexander, and as many as were of the kindred of the chief priest, and having set them in the midst, they were inquiring, `In what power, or in what name did ye do this?’

Then Peter, having been filled with the Holy Spirit, said unto them: `Rulers of the people, and elders of Israel, if we to-day are examined concerning the good deed to the ailing man, by whom he hath been saved, be it known to all of you, and to all the people of Israel, that in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, whom ye did crucify, whom God did raise out of the dead, in him hath this one stood by before you whole.
‘This is the stone that was set at nought by you – the builders, that became head of a corner; and there is not salvation in any other, for there is no other name under the heaven that hath been given among men, in which it behoveth us to be saved.’

And beholding the openness of Peter and John, and having perceived that they are men unlettered and plebeian, they were wondering – they were taking knowledge also of them that with Jesus they had been – and seeing the man standing with them who hath been healed, they had nothing to say against [it], and having commanded them to go away out of the sanhedrim, they took counsel with one another, saying, ‘What shall we do to these men? because that, indeed, a notable sign hath been done through them, to all those dwelling in Jerusalem [is] manifest, and we are not able to deny [it]; but that it may spread no further toward the people, let us strictly threaten them no more to speak in this name to any man.’

Whereas today, where we usually expect authors to have penned their own books with their own hands, in the ancient world, it was more common for people - even those who have writing skills (since reading and writing are actually separate skills by themselves, even though children learn them as a set these days) - to have scribes, or amanuenses, write for them whatever they want written (cf. 1 Kings 21:8-9; 1 Chronicles 24:6; Ezra 4:7-23; Nehemiah 9:38-10:27; Esther 3:12-14; 8:3-10; 9:29; Jeremiah 36:4-6, 27, 32; 45:1; Romans 16:22; 1 Peter 5:12 for examples of writing for another or copying). After all, in those days before software, just because somebody can write is not an automatic guarantee of beautiful penmanship or professional formatting. I mean, to give myself as a modern example, I could read and write, but my personal handwriting is so atrocious that it is infamous for being illegible (including to myself ). Books and letters are meant to be read after all: we do not want to discourage the reader and waste his time by making him read run-on amateurish scrawls that looks like they were written by a three-year-old.

 

[patrick457]

I would go in the opposite direction as the OP and, instead of asking and looking at why John can’t be the ‘beloved disciple’, look at why the ancients thought that it was precisely John.

First off, what do we know about this disciple? For one, we see that he is often with Peter