Dating of Jonn's Gospel
The Fourth Gospel originally accepted as a product of 2nd century Hellenistic composition is now widely accepted as a later first century Jewish writing that may even contain some of the oldest traditions of the Gospels. Would it make more sense if the Gospel was written earlier? If we think Jesus was born around 4 BC, and He was 33 when He was preaching, and if we think John was around that age too, then would it make sense to assume that it is a 2nd century document? If it were written in the 2nd century, John would not have been able to write it because he would have been dead. I think I am chasing rabbits here.
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I would use Logos Bible Introductions, Handbooks, Encyclopedias and Commentaries to learn what scholars think about dating John's Gospel. I found a wealth of information in about 2 minutes.
I wouldn't do a search (though you could), but just open the resources you have and scan the introductory material for words like "Dating."
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You're assuming Jesus' disciple John wrote 'John'. The earliest mss's don't identify authorship, or 'which John'. Only a century later do the fathers have assigned names (eg Papias with 2 not matching our present day exemplars).
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Christian Alexander said:
The Fourth Gospel originally accepted as a product of 2nd century Hellenistic composition is now widely accepted as a later first century Jewish writing that may even contain some of the oldest traditions of the Gospels. Would it make more sense if the Gospel was written earlier? If we think Jesus was born around 4 BC, and He was 33 when He was preaching, and if we think John was around that age too, then would it make sense to assume that it is a 2nd century document? If it were written in the 2nd century, John would not have been able to write it because he would have been dead. I think I am chasing rabbits here.
These are excellent questions, but I just want to gently note/remind you that we aren't supposed to discuss potentially controversial questions like these in Faithlife's forums.
What we can do is recommend and discuss resources sold by Faithlife (or which we recommend Faithlife try to sell in the future) that discuss these questions. [:)]
“The trouble is that everyone talks about reforming others and no one thinks about reforming himself.” St. Peter of Alcántara
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Christian Alexander said:
If we think Jesus was born around 4 BC, and He was 33 when He was preaching, and if we think John was around that age too, then would it make sense to assume that it is a 2nd century document?
If we assume the Gospels are accurate, then we know that Jesus must have been born before Herod died in 4 BC. But why would you assume that Jesus and John were around the same age? John could have easily been 10 years, or more, younger. Tradition seems to indicate John was the last of the Apostles to die. So, he likely lived to an old age.
Since the "Gospel of John" is anonymous, we cannot know for sure who wrote it. However, the statement by the Church Fathers, even 100 years later, carries more weight with me than the arguments against John's authorship.
"In all cases, the Church is to be judged by the Scripture, not the Scripture by the Church," John Wesley0
