The Cradle, the Cross, and the Crown (185 page)

²⁶
V. S. Poythress, “Testing for Johannine Authorship by Examining the Use of Conjunctions,”
WTJ 46
(1984): 350—69. Poythress's test has its flaws, but the general premise is well founded and still holds up to scrutiny. See L. S. Kellum,
The Unity of the Farewell Discourse: The Literary Integrity of John 13.31—16.33
, JSNTSup 256 (New York: T&T Clark, 2004), 113-21.

²⁷
Polycarp's letter, dated to the first decade of the second century (see above), has a decidedly non-Johannine linguistic stamp. Polycarp does not use
hina
(“in order that”) in the same way as the Johannine Epistles; his letter employs
oun
(“therefore”) far more frequently in expository genres; it does not use the word
kosmos
(“world”) but features
aiōna
(“age”) instead; and the very Johannine terms
ekeinos
(“that one”) and
menō
(“remain”) are not used at all. Yet Polycarp was very familiar with John's Gospel, and the Johannine Epistles and considered them authoritative.

²⁸
W. G. Kümmel,
Introduction to the New Testament
, rev. ed., trans. H. C. Kee (Nashville: Abingdon, 1975), 445.

²⁹
1 John 1:1,2,3,4,5; 4:6,14; 3 John 10,12.

³⁰
E.g., Brown,
Epistles
, 94-95; and Painter,
1, 2, 3 John
, 45-46.

³¹
Cited in Eusebius,
Eccl. Hist.
3.39.5-7.

³²
See Brooke,
Epistles
, xix—xxii; and Grayston,
Johannine Epistles
, 12—14.

³³
D. A. Carson and D. J. Moo,
An Introduction to the New Testament
, 2d ed. (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2005), 676.

³⁴
Irenaeus
(Against Heresies
22.22.5; 3.3.4; quoted by Eusebius,
Eccl. Hist.
3.23.3—4), placed John's death during the reign of Trajan (98—117); Jerome (
Vir. Ill.
9) said that John died in the sixty-eighth year after Jesus’ passion (98 or 101).

³⁵
Eusebius,
Eccl. Hist.
3.31.3; 5.24.2.

³⁶
Irenaeus,
Against Heresies
3.1.1.

³⁷
A minority does posit other provenances. E.g., Kümmel
(Introduction
, 445) advocated a Syrian provenance for John's Gospel on the grounds of “substantive contacts” with the Odes of Solomon (which presumably came from Syria) and with Ignatius of Antioch (died c. 110; see ibid., 247, with further bibliographic references in n. 224), and he conjectured that the Letters were also written there. Regarding theories that point to linguistic similarities to Gnosticism in Palestine, R. Schnackenburg
(The johannine Epistles
, trans. R. and I. Fuller [New York: Crossroad, 1992], 40) is undoubtedly correct: “All it means is that the author was born in Palestine.”

³⁸
Augustine's ascription of the letter
ad Parthos
, “to the Parthians,” is almost certainly incorrect and may be a corruption of
tou parthenou
(“of the virgin”), a possible reference to John who was frequently regarded as celibate. See P. Schaff, ed.,
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers
, vol. 7:
Augustin
[sic]:
Homilies on the Gospel of John, Homilies on the First Epistle of John, Soliloquies
, First Series (Peabody: Hendrickson, 1994), 459, n. 1. The title of Augustine's manuscripts is “Ten Homilies on the Epistle of John to the Parthians.”

³⁹
Second and 3 John are more readily recognizable as examples of the first-century personal letter. Both are rather short (245 and 219 words, respectively) and would easily fit on one papyrus sheet (typical of first-century letters). For a helpful treatment, see the chapter on “New Testament Letters” in Carson and Moo,
Introduction to the New Testament
, 331—53, esp. 332—33 (including further bibliographic references).

⁴⁰
Irenaeus
(Against Heresies
3.11.1) also related a confrontation between Cerinthus and John. He noted that John refused to stay in a bath house occupied by Cerinthus and advised the people to flee, “lest even the bath house fall down.” Irenaeus (ibid., 3.3.4) named Polycarp as the source of this tradition.

⁴¹
E.g., R. Gundry
(A Survey of the New Testament
, 3d ed. [Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1994], 448—49) proposed that Cerinthus is the culprit. But Schnackenburg
(Epistles
, 21—23) noted several differences between the secessionists in 1 John and both Cerinthus and Ignatius's opponents mentioned below.

⁴²
It has been pointed out that Ignatius's letter to the Smyrneans and to the Trallians (in southwest Asia Minor) both show a docetic-type heresy that denies that Christ was actually human (from
dokeō
, “seem,” the teaching that Jesus only
appeared
to be human). This is also addressed in his letter to the Ephesians (Ignatius,
To the Smyrnaeans
2.1, 5.2;
To the Trallians
10.1; and
To the Ephesians
7.1). See Marshall,
Epistles
, xx; P. J. Achtemeier, J. B. Green, and M. M. Thompson,
Introducingthe New Testament: Its Literature and Theology
(Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2001), 539; and E Thielman,
Theology of the New Testament: A Canonical and Synthetic Approach
(Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2005), 539—40. Since Ignatius addressed all his letters to churches in Asia Minor, it is likely that something like the docetic doctrines flourished in John's time as well.

⁴³
So Schnackenburg,
Epistles
, 21—23.

⁴⁴
Ibid., 17.

⁴⁵
T. Griffith
(Keep Yourselves from Idols: A New Look at 1 John
[London: Sheffield Academic Press, 2002]) asserted that the secessionists were reverting back to Judaism and that “in the flesh” does not refer to a docetic theology but merely represents a way of expressing the incarnation. Another nonpolemical argument is found in J. M. Lieu, “‘Authority to Become Children of God’: A Study of 1 John,”
NovT
(1981): 210-28.

⁴⁶
The statement in 2:26 (“I have written these things to you about those who are trying to deceive you”) goes back at least as far as 2:18. In 2:22, it is stated that the opponents denied that Jesus was the Messiah (though the exact nature of this denial is not specified). The references to denying and confessing the Son in 2:23 are also general in nature.

⁴⁷
For this reason the reference to Jesus having “come in the flesh” in 1 John 4:2 may resemble the affirmation that God “was revealed in the flesh” in 1 Tim 3:16 (NASB).

⁴⁸
Most are not nearly so cautious. See Achtemeier, Green, and Thompson,
Introducing the New Testament
, 539—42.

⁴⁹
D. L. Akin,
1, 2, 3 John
, NAC 38 (Nashville: B&H, 2001), 31.

⁵⁰
The phrase “those who are trying to deceive you” (substantive participle
tōn planōtōn)
in 1 John 2:26 is in the present tense, indicating contemporaneous action with the main verb (in this case an epistolary aorist, “I wrote”). It follows that, at the time of writing of 1 John, the false teachers were still trying to infiltrate the churches with their false doctrine.

⁵¹
Thielman,
Theology of the New Testament
, 536.

⁵²
R. Longacre (“Towards an Exegesis of 1 John,” in
Linguistics and New Testament Interpretation
, ed. D. A. Black [Nashville: B&H, 1992], 278—79) observed that while only about 9 percent of the verbs are imperative in form, they dominate the passages in which they occur.

⁵³
Guthrie,
New Testament Introduction
, 867.

⁵⁴
See 1 John 2:4—5,12—15 and the repeated exhortations to “remain” in Christ (1 John 2:24,27—28; 3:17; 4:13; 2 John 1:9; see 1 John 3:14).

⁵⁵
E.g., G. Strecker
(The Johannine Letters: A Commentary on 1, 2, and 3 John
, Hermeneia, trans. L. M. Maloney [Minneapolis: Fortress, 1996], 3) argued that both 2 and 3 John are earlier than 1 John. The usage of the term “elder” in no way lends credibility to the myth of a “John the elder” mentioned earlier.

⁵⁶
Schnackenburg,
Epistles
, 270.

⁵⁷
Brown
(Epistles
, 652—53) noted a host of contrary opinions all revolving around a single individual: (1) a lady named “Electa”; (2) “a noble Kyria” (Alford, Bengel, de Wette, Ebrard, Lücke, and Neander); (3) “a Dear Lady” (i.e., a woman of some importance; Plummer, Ross); and (4) the universal church (Schmiedel).

⁵⁸
So Carson and Moo,
Introduction to the New Testament
, 677; Brown,
Epistles
, 655; C. G. Kruse,
The Letters of John
, PNTC (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000), 38; Marshall,
Epistles
, 60; Brooke,
Epistles
, 167-70.

⁵⁹
For a judicious treatment, see J. R. W. Stott,
Letters of John
, TNTC, rev. ed. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1988), 203-5.

⁶⁰
Achtemeier, Green, and Thompson,
Introducing the New Testament
, 548.

⁶¹
As Carson and Moo
(Introduction to the New Testament
, 677) observed, this Gaius is likely neither the Gaius of Corinth (Rom 16:23; 1 Cor 1:14) nor the Gaius of Macedonia (Acts 19:29) nor the Gaius of Derbe (Acts 20:4; against the fourth-century
Apostolic Constitutions
7.46.9).

⁶²
Nothing is known about Demetrius or Diotrephes apart from the references to these individuals in 2 John.

⁶³
J. L. White, “Ancient Greek Letters,” in
Greco-Roman Literature and the New Testament
, ed. D. E. Aune, SBLSBS 21 Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1988), 100; cf. J. A. D. Weima, “Letters, Greco-Roman,” in
Dictionary of New Testament Background
, ed. C. A. Evans and S. E. Porter (Downers Grove: InterVarsity, 2000), 640—44.

⁶⁴
D. Aune,
The New Testament in Its Literary Environment
(Philadelphia: Westminster, 1987), 163—64.

⁶⁵
Brown,
Epistles
, 87.

⁶⁶
S. S. Smalley,
1, 2, 3 John
, WBC 51 (rev. ed.; Nashville: Nelson, 2007), xxx.

⁶⁷
Windisch,
Die Katholischen Briefe
, HNT 15, 3d rev. ed. (Tübingen: Mohr, 1951), 136, cited in Brown,
Epistles
, 87.

⁶⁸
K. Grayston,
The Johannine Epistles
, New Century Bible (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1984), 4.

⁶⁹
Brown
(Epistles
, 90) admitted that this is a choice not to make a choice, so he simply described the contents.

⁷⁰
J. V. Hills, “A Genre for 1 John,” in
The Future of Early Christianity: Essays in Honor of Helmut Koester
(Minneapolis: Fortress, 1991), 367.

⁷¹
See Aune,
Literary Environment
, 203.

⁷²
For a survey of recent options see B. Olsson, “First John: Discourse Analyses and Interpretations,” in
Discourse Analysis and the New Testament: Approaches and Results
, ed. S. E. Porter and J. T. Reed, JSNTSup 170, Studies in New Testament Greek 4 (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1999), 369-91.

⁷³
E.g., P. J. van Staden (“The Debate on the Structure of 1 John,”
Hervormde Teologiese Studies
47 [1991]: 487—502) argued for a macro-chiasm. Marshall
(Epistles
, 26) suggested that there is no coherent structure, and Kruse
(Letters of John
, 32) said his analysis of the letter does not “trace any developing argument through the letter because there isn't one.”

⁷⁴
The most recent to propose a series of sources edited into one document is J. C. O'Neill,
The Puzzle of 1 John: A New Examination of Origins
(London: SPCK, 1966); yet Marshall
(Epistles
, 30) noted that his theory is “completely speculative, and has won no adherents.” For other source theories, see E. von Dobschütz, “Johanneische Studien I,”
ZNW 8
(1907): 1—8; R. Bultmann,
The Johannine Epistles
, Hermeneia, trans. R. P. O'Hara et al. (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1973); and W. Nauck,
Die Tradition undder Charakter des ersten Johannesbriefes
, WUNT 3 (Tübingen: Mohr, 1953). For a rearrangement theory, see K. Tomoi, “The Plan of the First Epistle of John,”
Exp Tim
52 (1940-41): 117-19.

⁷⁵
Schnackenburg
(Epistles
, 12—13) is doubtless correct when he said that the author “does not merely sail along without any particular plan.”

⁷⁶
Brown,
Epistles of John
, 116-29.

⁷⁷
The presentation of structural proposals for 1 John below is adapted from the chart in Brown,
Epistles
, 764; see also L. Scott Kellum, “On the Semantic Structure of 1 John: A Modest Proposal,”
Faith and Mission
23 (2008): 36—38. The works cited are J. Chaine,
Les Epîtres Catholiques
, EB, 2d ed. (Paris: Gabalda, 1939), 97—260; Longacre, “Exegesis of 1 John”; G. M. Burge,
The Letters of John
, NIVAC (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1996); Schnackenburg,
Epistles;
M. M. Thompson, in Achtemeier, Green, and Thompson,
Introducing the New Testament; F.-
M. Braun, “Les Epîtres de Saint Jean,” in
LEvangile de Saint Jean
, SBJ (3d rev. ed.; Paris: Cerf, 1973), 231—77; Guthrie,
New Testament Introduction; F.
F. Bruce,
The Epistles of John
(Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1979); and Stott,
Letters of John.

⁷⁸
For a thorough analysis of the structure of 1 John, see Kellum, “Semantic Structure of 1 John,” 34—82.

⁷⁹
Interestingly, the verb
graphō
(“to write”) is used nine times in chaps. 1—2 and not again until the conclusion in 5:13. See Longacre, “Toward an Exegesis of 1 John,” 276—77.

⁸⁰
Most likely, 2:2 concludes this section. For a detailed defense, see J. Callow, “Where Does 1 John 1 End?” in
Discourse Analysis and the New Testament
, 392—406.