Islams beliefs concerning Christianity

Gospel according to John

Some little tid bits about who wrote it. Gather your own conclusions.

This Gospel records little extra details that could only have been known by one who was there. For example, the loaves that the lad brought to Jesus at the Feeding of Five Thousand were barley loaves (6:9); that the disciples had rowed three and four miles when Jesus came to them walking on the water in the storm (6:19); that there were six stone waterpots at Cana of Galilee (2:6); that four soldiers gambled for the seamless robe as Jesus died (19:23) and that aloes were used to anoint the dead body of Jesus (19:39); that the perfume of the ointment filled the house at the anointing at Bethany (12:3). These are such unimportant details that only a person who was there would have remembered them. This points to John as the writer of this Gospel.

Internally, the author identifies himself as "the disciple that Jesus loved... who has written these things" (21:20, 24); this is not egoism, but only indicates that the contents of the Gospel comes from one in whom Jesus had confided. He never refers to himself by name in the Gospel. The unnamed disciple, referred to in 13:23-24; 19:26-27; 20:2-10, is never identified by name. In every instance, except at the cross in 19:26, he is with Simon Peter, and he may be "the other disciple" who is with Peter when they went into the house of the high priest at the trial (18:15-16). The synoptists tell us that James and John, the sons of Zebedee, worked at fishing with Peter; and with him formed the inner circle of the Twelve. Since James had died earlier as a martyr (Acts 12:1-5) and since Peter is clearly distinguished from the beloved disciple (John 20:2-10), only John is left to be the beloved disciple and the author of the Fourth Gospel. Early Christian writers called the author of the Fourth Gospel "the beloved disciple" and identified him with the Apostle John, the son of Zebedee.

Last, all the early church fathers from the time of Irenaeus held to the Johannine authorship of this Gospel. Clement of Alexandria (A.D. 190), Origen (about A.D. 220), Hippolytus (about A.D. 225), Tertullian (about A.D. 200), and the Muratorian Fragment (about A.D. 170) agree in attributing the authorship of the Fourth Gospel to John, son of Zebedee. The earliest witness is that of Irenaeus who was bishop of Lyons about A.D. 177; he was himself a disciple of Polycarp, who in turn was a disciple of the Apostle John. He writes,

"John, the disciple of the Lord, who also leant upon his breast, himself also published the gospel in Ephesus, when he was live in Asia."

Note that Irenaeus does not merely say that John wrote the Gospel; he says that John published (exedoke) in Ephesus. The Greek word that Irenaeus uses implies that the Gospel was not just a private writing of some personal memoir, but that it was a public publication like a official document.

The next witness is that of Clement who was the head of the great Catechetical School at Alexandria about A.D. 190. He writes,

"Last of all, John, perceiving that what had reference to the bodily things of Jesus's ministry had been sufficiently related, and encouraged by his friends, and inspired by the Holy Spirit, wrote a spiritual gospel."

My conclusion is that John did write the gospel book. The book itself gave unimportant small details as listed above, however these details could only have been known by the one who was there. All the other disciples such as Peter and James who made up the inner circle, are ruled out and John is left as the only writer. John�s Gospel was writen later than the other gospels and was also copied and maintained by the Church even until the 2^nd Century where we can see early Christians accepting this Gospel as written by John. You must understand that there are liberal Christians in the world who may differ, but what does the Bible say? What does history say? John wrote it.

Robin

http://fromdeathtolife.org/jnintro.html