“And We Know His
Testimony Is True”: John 21:24, Authorial Plurals and Traditional Authorship
Introduction
In this blog post we will discuss John
21:24, authorial plurals and its implications for traditional authorship of the
Gospel of John.
Different grammatical
usages of “We”
Critics often argue that the “we” in John
21:24 differentiates the author of the gospel and the alleged eyewitness source
material. Bart Ehrman remarks,
[a]t the end of
the Gospel [of John] the author says of the “Beloved Disciple”…[John 21:24]…Note
how the author differentiates between his source of information, “the disciple
who testifies,” and himself: “we know that his testimony is true.” He/we: this
author is not the disciple. He claims to have gotten some of his information
from the disciple.[1]
However, this is an oversimplification of John
21:24 and first-person plurals. The NRSV renders this passage as
[t]his is the
disciple who is testifying to these things and has written them, and we know [οἴδαμεν]
that his testimony is true.
“This…disciple” is the “disciple whom
Jesus loved” in 21:20. “These things” [ταῦτα] likely refers to the entire Gospel
in light of 21:25.
There are several possible grammatical
uses of οἴδαμεν and notice how none of these options exclude the author as an
eyewitness:
1.)
Associativeà “we” as in the author includes
him/herself with his/her audience [“we” = “I and you”]
2.)
Dissociativeà “we” as in the author distinguishes
between a group they belong to and the readers [“we” = “I and my colleagues”]
3.)
Authoritative
testimonyà “we as in a
substitute for “I” to bring added authority to self-reference[2]
If the verb is used in the associative
sense, it could be referring to the authors and his readers, or an appeal to
common knowledge. If the dissociative, it could be referring to the author and
his colleagues, in this case, the Beloved Disciple and Jesus’ other disciples.
Obviously, with the last option it is self-referential.
Whiles I think both the associative and
dissociative usage makes a lot of sense, Richard Bauckham—drawing upon an
earlier study—argues rather compellingly that the “we” is interpreted best as the
last option by scavenging through various Johannine texts’ usage of “we.”[3]
Objections
Alan Culpepper objects to an authorial
plural understanding of the “we” by highlighting the grammatical difficulty of
the changing role of the author. In his view, 21:24 reveals several redactors
within the Johannine community. He writes, “[i]t is unlikely that readers would
understand that ‘this disciple,’ ‘we,’ and ‘I’ in the scope of these two verses
all refer to the author.”[4]
In reply, Charles E. Hill points out,
The shifts, from
third person singular to first person singular in the final verse, are issues
for any view to explain. There are, however, two Johannine passages in
particular that offer important comparisons, where not only are there shifts in
a speaker’s pronouns but where we arguably have real examples of Johannine,
authorial plurals.[5]
Essentially, quick shifts between persons
are common in Johannine literature:
John 3:11-15à Jesus to Nicodemus: “I tell you…we
know and testify to what we have seen…the Son of Man be lifted up…” Jesus switches
from first person singular to first person plural to third person singular in
the span of four verses.
3 John 9-10, 12à I have written…[Diotrephes] does
not acknowledge our authority…so if I come, I will call attention to what he is
doing in spreading false charges against us.” Similarly, the elder in 3 John
switches from first person singular to first person plural back to first person
singular and ends in first person plural.[6]
It is highly implausible that in these two
passages, the speaker does not include himself within any of the first person
plurals, thus providing evidence against the conventional model.[7]
In conclusion, the “we” used in 21:24 does
not disqualify the Beloved Disciple as the main author of the Gospel of John.
[1] Ehrman, Bart D. Jesus, Interrupted: Revealing the Hidden Contradictions in the Bible. HarperOne, 2010., 104.
[2] Bauckham, Richard. Jesus and the Eyewitnesses: The Gospels as Eyewitness Testimony. 2nd ed., William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company., 2017., 371-72.; Harnack, Adolf von. “Das ‘Wir’ in den Johanneischen Schriften.” SPAW, Philosophischhistorischen Klasse, 1923., 96-113.
[7] The conventional model holds that the Gospel of John is a product of several redactors within the Johannine community. See Brown, Raymond. The Community of the Beloved Disciple. Paulist Press,1979 for an articulate, yet admittedly speculative, defense of this model.