So all of this is assumption. Every single point.
We all make assumptions. You make assumptions in regards the likelihood that an elderly man could have written the Gospel of John or the literacy of the Apostle John.
1. yes of course the author has to acknowledge it.
He prefaces the paper with the ‘fact’ there is no explicit mention of the authors name. He then presents an argument based on further ‘facts’ and concludes that in his opinion, the Apostle John is the most likely of the five candidates being considered to the author. He does not state his conclusion as fact, but as the ‘best solution’. The various uses of the phrase beloved disciple and the names of some early Christians who believed the Apostle John was the author are facts.
So he does what reasonable people do. He deals with facts to which his conclusion is based. For that he has my respect and its why I felt comfortable linking his blog.
2. Of course your argument is an apologetic, but ahistorical. You dont assume things based on other assumptions that are based on other assumptions. It is common to write in the third person narrative when it comes to historical records, not when you are writing your own experience and your own self. If the superscript was not there in your Bible you would not be making this argument, thus you are assuming its the original, but its not. So your assumption that a man lived to be 95 years old, and he wrote a book out of memory after 70 years, you are assuming the disciple was maximum 25 years which is a "Could Be" situation, and you are ignoring the synoptic problem and johannine inferiority in stating its the same person. Everything is a could be, and an assumption.
The author is a Christian apologist, I am a Baha’i apologist and you are a Muslim apologist as far as I can see. That doesn’t mean we are ahistorical or even biased. It means we look at the evidence and examine whether or not it supports our traditional point of view. It also means we can have biases. That’s fine as long as we are conscious of our biases.
The traditional Christian perspective until the twentieth century has been John the Apostle wrote the Gospel of John. That is fact. Within Western culture there has been a growing movement to critically evaluate Biblical texts using similar methodology to examine any other historical texts. That has opened new doors of understanding and led to the questioning of long held beliefs and assumptions. We all know this and it is nothing new.
I suspect the anonymity of the Gospel authors has little to do whether or not history is being recorded but out of respect for the Holy Personage of Jesus the Christ. It is a sign of profound humility. The authors would also consider themselves as writing an historical account and I understand it was common place in Roman culture to write mythologised biographies.
In regards the authors age, we are of course making assumptions about the dating of Christ’s ministry and when the Gospel of John was written. You are assuming I have adopted the traditional Christian perspective despite my repeated statements to the contrary.
According to Wikipedia
John reached its final form around AD 90–110,
[4] although it contains signs of origins dating back to AD 70 and possibly even earlier.
[5]
- Lincoln 2005, p. 18.
- ^ Hendricks 2007, p. 147.
Gospel of John - Wikipedia
I'm certainly open to the possibility that the Apostle John did not write and compile the Gospel of John alone and it may well have been a collaborative effort thus giving support to the Johannine community theory.
Some of the outstanding early Babi's were youth. The Bab Himself was just 25 years old when He declared His Divine mission to be the Promised Mahdi. Anis who was martyred alongside was a youth.
How Two Youth Led a Spiritual Revolution in the 19th Century
Badíʻ is famous for being the bearer of a tablet written by Baháʼu'lláh to
Nasiri'd-Din Shah, for which he was tortured and killed at the age of 17. He is also one of the foremost
Apostles of Baháʼu'lláh.
Badíʻ - Wikipedia
On the other end of the spectrum one of the most famous Baha'i teachers in the Baha'u'llah's time was Ahmad who lived to the age of 100 years and was noted to be in the utmost health and vigor at the age of 96 years when He was still travelling and teaching in Persia despite intense opposition.
So I would avoid making assumptions based on age about a person's spiritual capacity or to write a book. The Apostle John may well have been a youth during the time of Christ's Ministry and lived to an old age where he was in excellent health despite his advanced years. He may also have written the bulk of the Gospel as early as 70 AD and the text was redacted by the Johannine community before entering into wider circulation.
One criticism I would put forward about Gary Burge's blog is that it fails to consider the Johannine community as being the author. This is of course is the prevailing belief about the origins of the Gospel of John among the majority of scholars.
Please do elaborate on how you believe the synoptic problem and Johannine inferiority are relevant to this discussion.
3. This is another assumption. And everything seems to be an allusion. It does not allude to the author. It just says "this guy was there, and he wrote things down". This is a centuries past, post assumption of superscript, assumption of authorship, with an assumption of a name.
The book doesnt call itself John. The author doesnt call himself John. None of the authors name themselves John. Two endings can be found in John in chapters 10 and 12 only for the first part of the Gospel. Then there are two endings for the gospel in chapters 20 and 21. A redactor has added text which shows that the original author was not present at the time it was done. One of the things that is probably fatal to the theor)' that john son of Zebdee is the Beloved Disciple and also the author of this entire document is that none. and I do mean none. of the special Zebedee stories from the Synoptics are included in the Fourth Gospel. It is equally strange that the Zebedee brothers are so briefly mentioned in this Gospel (only in
John 21:2} and that john is never explicitly equated with the Beloved Disciple. These are a few of the arguments, but your article does not address these but speaks of some lame arguments which are strawman as I said.
When you say 'lame' arguments it simply makes you look biased and prejudiced, just as you harshly criticised Dibdin and my fellow Baha'is on this forum. The arguments the blog does not address such as the author's age and the likelihood that the Apostle John was illiterate are weak arguments and easily refuted IMHO.
There references in regard to the beloved disciple are:
John 13:23: “One of them, the disciple whom Jesus loved, was reclining next to him.
John 19:26: “When Jesus saw his mother there, and the disciple whom he loved standing nearby, he said to her, ‘Woman, here is your son.’
John 20:2: “So she came running to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one Jesus loved, and said, ‘They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we don’t know where they have put him!’
John 21:7: “Then the disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, ‘It is the Lord!’
John 20:20: “Peter turned and saw that the disciple whom Jesus loved was following them.”
John 21:24 “disciple who testifies to these things and who wrote them down.”
This is fact. I would presume the narrative that the beloved disciple was John the Apostle has been with Christianity for centuries as this has been the traditional Christian understanding from the early centuries of Christianity. It is clearly consistent with the written text.
The references to early Christian works amply support the early Christian belief:
Irenaeus, writing at about AD 200, says that the Beloved Disciple was John, the disciple of Jesus, and that John originated the Gospel at Ephesus. He writes that when he himself was young, he knew another teacher, Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna (c. AD 69–155), who claimed to have been tutored by John.
The church historian Eusebius (c. AD 300) records this John/Polycarp/Irenaeus connection in the same way
Polycrates, Bishop of Ephesus (AD 189–198), refers to John’s association with the Gospel in his letter to Victor the Bishop of Rome
It is also confirmed by Clement of Alexandria (c. AD 200) and the Latin Muratorian Canon (AD 180–200).
The Apostle John forming part of the Johannine collaboration would address any concerns about a redacted text.
