Regarding John 21:23:
Martin Hengel wrote (The Johannine Question, pp. 76-77, 79-80):
Because of this, the rumor spread among the brothers that this disciple would not die. However, Jesus did not say that he would not die, but only, “If I want him to remain until I return, what is that to you?”
Martin Hengel wrote (The Johannine Question, pp. 76-77, 79-80):
The next verse now expresses a manifest dilemma among the group of followers of the 'beloved disciple': on the basis of this saying of Jesus the rumour is said to have circulated among the 'brethren' 'that the disciple would not die' (we should add 'before the Lord comes'). Whereas the earlier parallel tradition Mark 9.1 still says that 'some of those standing here' 'will not taste of death until they see the kingdom of God coming in power', a generation later this privilege - at least in the circle of followers but probably also outside it - was to be attributed to only one outsider, the mysterious beloved disciple. They had been of the view that the one 'whom the Lord loved' had been marked out by Jesus himself as being the only one among the disciples who would still be alive to see the coming of the Lord.
My colleague the Arabist Herr von Ess here drew my attention to a remarkable parallel from the early Islamic tradition: in the earliest period of Islam the 'friends of the prophet', i.e. men and women who had still known the prophet Muhammad personally, were highly regarded in individual provinces as 'bearers of the tradition'. 'In Basra this was Anas b. Malik; he was perhaps the last of them all. When he was very old, the children would run after him and shout, "That is the friend of the prophet who will not die until he has seen the Antichrist." The Antichrist is a sign of the end-time, so it was evidently expected that Anas would live to experience the end of the world' (written communication of 16 January 1987). A modern example is the leading 'apostle' of the Neoapostolic Community, J. G. Bischoff, who died on 6 July 1960 at the age of more than eighty-nine; 'from 1951 he declared it to be a revelation of God that Christ would bring the community home as bride during his own lifetime. The Neoapostolic community quite firmly believed this. Open doubt about it would have been apostasy ... Birschoff's death shook them quite considerably.'
The death of the disciple proved this hope to be an error and the widespread rumour was explained as a misunderstanding of that saying of the risen Christ on the part of the 'brethren'. The whole section has an apologetic character as far as the editor (or editors) is concerned. After the event it was possible to explain the false expectation, which had certainly also provoked criticism of the school and its teacher, and in this way lessen the pain of disappointed hope. The recent interepretation of John 21.20 by J. Kugler, who regards even John 21.20-25 as pure literary fiction, including the 'rumour' in 21.23 and the 'redactional' reference to the author in 21.24, is utterly unconvincing and discredits the method of the author, who wants to 'free the way' to denying any historical reality in the Fourth Gospel. In this context (21.18-23) the 'beloved disciple' is no more 'pure fiction' than his counterpart Peter. ...
In accordance with Johannine thought, all these 'reports of disciples' have deeper, 'symbolic' meaning, but this need not mean that for the school the disciple was a shadowy, non-existent entity, for at two points this enigmatic, ideal and anonymous figure becomes - ultimately - a 'historical' personality: first the editors stress explicitly that he is the author of the Gospel, and second, this person in advanced old age, long after the martyrdom of Peter, becomes the cause of a painful error: he dies at an exceptionally old age, although among 'the brethren', i.e. his circle of followers, there was a widespread rumour that he would be the only disciple to experience the parousia of the Lord. Something of this kind is incompatible with an unhistorical ideal figure: here there is an allusion to a historical event which was painful for the school and which had to be explained. There is no question that his death had been a sharp disappointment for 'the brethren'. 'Even John died, of whom it had been hoped in vain that he would live to see the coming of the Lord', says Tertullian in connection with the Gnostic Menander - a contemporary of the Johannine school - who had claimed that death could not touch those who had been baptized by him.
My colleague the Arabist Herr von Ess here drew my attention to a remarkable parallel from the early Islamic tradition: in the earliest period of Islam the 'friends of the prophet', i.e. men and women who had still known the prophet Muhammad personally, were highly regarded in individual provinces as 'bearers of the tradition'. 'In Basra this was Anas b. Malik; he was perhaps the last of them all. When he was very old, the children would run after him and shout, "That is the friend of the prophet who will not die until he has seen the Antichrist." The Antichrist is a sign of the end-time, so it was evidently expected that Anas would live to experience the end of the world' (written communication of 16 January 1987). A modern example is the leading 'apostle' of the Neoapostolic Community, J. G. Bischoff, who died on 6 July 1960 at the age of more than eighty-nine; 'from 1951 he declared it to be a revelation of God that Christ would bring the community home as bride during his own lifetime. The Neoapostolic community quite firmly believed this. Open doubt about it would have been apostasy ... Birschoff's death shook them quite considerably.'
The death of the disciple proved this hope to be an error and the widespread rumour was explained as a misunderstanding of that saying of the risen Christ on the part of the 'brethren'. The whole section has an apologetic character as far as the editor (or editors) is concerned. After the event it was possible to explain the false expectation, which had certainly also provoked criticism of the school and its teacher, and in this way lessen the pain of disappointed hope. The recent interepretation of John 21.20 by J. Kugler, who regards even John 21.20-25 as pure literary fiction, including the 'rumour' in 21.23 and the 'redactional' reference to the author in 21.24, is utterly unconvincing and discredits the method of the author, who wants to 'free the way' to denying any historical reality in the Fourth Gospel. In this context (21.18-23) the 'beloved disciple' is no more 'pure fiction' than his counterpart Peter. ...
In accordance with Johannine thought, all these 'reports of disciples' have deeper, 'symbolic' meaning, but this need not mean that for the school the disciple was a shadowy, non-existent entity, for at two points this enigmatic, ideal and anonymous figure becomes - ultimately - a 'historical' personality: first the editors stress explicitly that he is the author of the Gospel, and second, this person in advanced old age, long after the martyrdom of Peter, becomes the cause of a painful error: he dies at an exceptionally old age, although among 'the brethren', i.e. his circle of followers, there was a widespread rumour that he would be the only disciple to experience the parousia of the Lord. Something of this kind is incompatible with an unhistorical ideal figure: here there is an allusion to a historical event which was painful for the school and which had to be explained. There is no question that his death had been a sharp disappointment for 'the brethren'. 'Even John died, of whom it had been hoped in vain that he would live to see the coming of the Lord', says Tertullian in connection with the Gnostic Menander - a contemporary of the Johannine school - who had claimed that death could not touch those who had been baptized by him.
Statistics: Posted by Peter Kirby — Sat Jun 08, 2024 3:26 pm