effrontery and selfishness of the request, or the assurance with which the brethren assert their power to emulate the Master is more striking in this scene. Apparently, the grossness of the proceeding already began to be felt when our first Gospel was edited, for it represents the request as made by the mother of James and John; but that is a very slight decrease of the offence, inasmuch as the brethren are obviously consenting, if not inciting, parties to the prayer, and utter their "We can," with the same absence of "incomparable modesty."(1) After the death of Jesus, John remained in Jerusalem,(2) and chiefly confined his ministry to the city and its neighbourhood.(3) The account which Hegesippus gives of James the brother of Jesus who was appointed overseer of the Church in Jerusalem will not be forgotten,(4) and we refer to it merely in illustration of primitive Christianity. However mythical elements are worked up into the narrative, one point is undoubted fact, that the Christians of that community were but a sect of Judaism, merely superadding to Mosaic doctrines belief in the actual advent of the Messiah whom Moses and the prophets had foretold; and we find, in the Acts of the Apostles, Peter and John represented as "going up into the Temple at the hour of prayer,"(6) like other Jews. In the Epistle of Paul to the Galatians, we have most valuable evidence with regard to the Apostle John. Paul found him still in Jerusalem on the occasion of the visit referred to in that letter, about a.d. 50—53. We need not quote at length the important passage Gal. ii. 1 ff., but the fact
is undeniable, and stands upon stronger evidence than almost any other particular regarding the early Church, being distinctly and directly stated by Paul himself: that the three "pillar" Apostles representing the Church there were James, Peter, and John. Peter is markedly termed the Apostle of the circumcision, and the differences between him and Paul are evidence of the opposition of their views. James and John are clearly represented as sharing the views of Peter, and whilst Paul finally agrees with them that he is to go to the Gentiles, the three [———] elect to continue their ministry to the circumcision.(1) Here is John, therefore, clearly devoted to the Apostleship of the circumcision as opposed to Paul, whose views, as we gather from the whole of Paul's account, were little more than tolerated by the [———]. Before leaving New Testament data, we may here point out the statement in the Acts of the Apostles that Peter and John were known to be "unlettered and ignorant men"(2) [———]. Later tradition mentions one or two circumstances regarding John to which we may briefly refer. Irenæus states: "There are those who heard him (Polycarp) say that John, the disciple of the Lord, going to bathe at Ephesus and perceiving Cerinthus within, rushed forth from the bath-house without bathing, but crying out: 'Let us fly lest the bath-house fall down: Cerinthus, the enemy of the truth, being within it.'... So great was the care which the Apostles and their disciples took not to hold even verbal intercourse with any of the corrupters of the truth,"(3) &c. Polycrates, who was Bishop of Ephesus
about the beginning of the third century, states that the Apostle John wore the mitre and petalon of the high priest [———],(1) a tradition which agrees with the Jewish tendencies of the Apostle of the circumcision as Paul describes him.(2)
Now if we compare these data regarding John the son of Zebedee with the character of John the author of the Apocalypse, as we trace it in the work itself, it is impossible not to be struck by the singular agreement. The Hebraistic Greek and abrupt inelegant diction are natural to the unlettered fisherman of Galilee, and the fierce and intolerant spirit which pervades the book is precisely that which formerly forbade the working of miracles, even in the name of the Master, by any not of the immediate circle of Jesus, and which desired to consume an inhospitable village with fire from heaven.(3) The Judaistic form of Christianity which is represented throughout the Apocalypse, and the Jewish elements which enter so largely into its whole composition, are precisely those
2 We need not refer to any of the other legends regarding
John, but it may be well to mention the tradition common
amongst the Fathers which assigned to him the cognomen of
"the Virgin." One Codex gives as the superscription of the
Apocalypse: "t[———]" and we know that it is reported in
early writings that, of all the Apostles, only John and the
Apostle Paul remained unmarried, whence probably, in part,
this title. In connection with this we may point to the
importance attached to virginity in the Apocalypse, xiv. 4;
cf. Schwegler, Das naohap. Zeit, ii. p. 264; Lilcke, Comm.
lib. d. Br. Joh., 1836, p. 32 f.; Craftier, Einl. N. T., i.
p. 21.
3 The very objection of Ewald regarding the glorification of
the Twelve, if true, would be singularly in keeping with the
audacious request of John and his brother, to sit on the
right and left hand of the glorified Jesus, for we find none
of the "incomparable modesty" which the imaginative critic
attributes to the author of the fourth Gospel in the John of
the Synoptics.
which we might expect from John the Apostle of the circumcision and the associate of James and of Peter in the very centre of Judaism. Parts of the Apocalypse, indeed, derive a new significance when we remember the opposition which the Apostle of the Gentiles met with from the Apostles of the circumcision, as plainly declared by Paul in his Epistle to the Galatians ii. 1. ff., and apparent in other parts of his writings.