Wednesday Bible Study: The Walk of John part 2

 

 

 

I may sound like a broken record, but the same verse we started with last week gave me another way of looking at it.  To remind you, here's that passage:

Joh 1:42  And he brought him to Jesus. And when Jesus saw him, He said, You are Simon the son of Jonah; you shall be called Cephas (which translated is, A stone). 

And this verse is going to start us on a whole new path about contradictions and the unknown.  I managed to get an entire 9 verses farther along this week, and in that space and the rabbit holes I found looking at them, I came up with a whole list of questions needing answered.  For example:

- Who is the "Disciple that Jesus loved" ( a famous phrase not used for another 12 chapters)?

- Who besides Andrew was also a Disciple of John the Baptist?

- Why of all the Disciples gathered did John only mention six, er, five, er, four?

-Why did one group of prospective Disciples get told "Come and see", and the other, "Follow me"?

-And one I guess has been around for a while yet I never knew about- who DID write the gospel of John?

So let me start with the first question I asked- why is Phillip's story told, and why does he keep appearing in John's tale? 

Joh 1:43  The next day Jesus decided to go to Galilee. He found Philip and said to him, "Follow me."
Joh 1:44  Now Philip was from Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter. 

Phillip was the first to be told, "Follow me".  And that made me wonder. One thing we know for sure is that Phillip spoke excellent Greek.  We know that because when the Greeks seeking Jesus came, they went to Phillip (12:21).  Thus, he was a gateway to the learned, and to the Gentiles.  But what was his importance to John?  We know John and his brother James, as well as Peter and Andrew, were part of a sizable fishing concern. We also (may) know from this passage:

Joh 18:15  And Simon Peter and another disciple followed Jesus. That disciple was known to the high priest, and he went in with Jesus into the court of the high priest. 

...and since John was the one that followed Jesus all the way to the Cross, that this was likely John, and John had an "in" with the priestly class.  But if John was the one, as many speculate, who was the Disciple of the Baptist with Andrew, why would he be both a follower of JTB and friends with the High Priest?  This alone makes me figure that it was James, his older brother, who was the other Disciple here...

Joh 1:40  One of the two who heard John and followed Him was Andrew, Simon Peter's brother. 

In my speculation, we find that Jesus was seeking men who were ready to question the Law and the Priests.  James, perhaps, makes that turn first; and John, likely well educated if he knew the priests, was probably a friend already of Greek-speaking Phillip.  That brings us to our next question: Is it Nathaniel, as here, or Bartholomew, as in the other three Gospels- or are they 2 different men?  I found it funny that the so-called experts who choose the 2 different men option cannot see Bartholomew- Bar-Tolmay, or "son of"- as Nathaniel's LAST name. After all, depending on the translation, Peter is referred to as Simon Bar-Jonah, son of Jonah.  And besides- the math just doesn't work out for it to be 2 men.

Phillip, maybe, had to be told, "Follow me", because he, like (perhaps- remember: speculation) John, hadn't come to that point of questioning.  But once convinced, he goes to Nathaniel Bar-Tolmay, to tell him.  A while back, I did a post in which I mentioned one commentator said that Jesus greeted Nathaniel thus:

Joh 1:47  Jesus saw Nathanael coming to Him and said of him, Behold an Israelite indeed in whom is no guile!

Because, he speculated, that Nathaniel, already questioning the priests, was mulling over this passage under the fig tree:

Psa 32:1  A Psalm of David. A Contemplation. Blessed is the man whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered.
Psa 32:2  Blessed is the man to whom Jehovah does not charge iniquity, and in whose spirit there is no guile.

Which explains part of Nathaniel's surprise at their introduction.  Nathaniel, like Andrew and whomever the "other" Disciple was, were seeking to learn about the Messiah what the priests weren't teaching.

Now, consider this:

2 Disciples were earnestly seeking the Messiah, and were told, "Come and see"...

One was seeking Him through the Word, and got a fairly supernatural introduction...

At least one hadn't quite yet made the decision to question, and was told, "Follow me"...

And for me, that leaves Peter and John.  But hold that thought.

I want to backtrack to this whole thing I discovered about John's authorship of the Gospel being questioned.  First, their reasoning:

The Fourth Gospel is written by someone who, based on their style and knowledge of the Greek language and grammar, would have to have been well-educated in Greek; on the other hand, as an uneducated illiterate Galilean fisherman, John the Apostle would most likely have had Aramaic as his native language, and no knowledge of any other language, let alone the ability to write in the sophisticated Greek of the Fourth Gospel. (Wiki)

That's a mighty hefty assumption- they were fishermen, they HAD to be stupid.  But if one's father was a well-to-do businessman, running a fishing concern, and had the ability to have his sons educated, and perhaps had contacts of a Greek-speaking nature (say, Phillip), this whole argument goes right into the rubbish.  With it you can put the arguments about John not being the "disciple Jesus loved", because every evidence in the Gospel itself points to it being John; but at least one critic claimed that it would have been hubris for the writer to claim he was the one, as if Jesus loved no other.  These arguments, in my opinion are made by men who have a vested interest in destroying the credibility of the Bible.

Now, let me use that to turn these last two lessons both on their heads.  For a long time, I was like them- I wondered what was up with John naming himself that.  Was he really that stuck on himself? Then I realized, it was the opposite.  What if my speculations were right, and John was one who, like Phillip, had to be told, "Follow me." What if, like Paul, he was so in love with the Law, that he would never have considered Jesus- until they met? To change one so totally, he would have to have an intense love for Jesus- and a deep knowledge of the ruin his life would have become without that love FROM Jesus.

Everyone of us can look at our sinful lives and say, "I was the one that Jesus SAVED." Is it so hard to see why John would address himself as the "one Jesus LOVED"?

And Peter? No one says- not even John in that passage I keep bringing up- says Jesus EXPLAINED precisely why he changed Peter's name.  He was the oldest, the strongest, the natural leader. Perhaps he was the most stubborn to be introduced.  And years later...

Mat 16:13  And coming into the parts of Caesarea Philippi, Jesus asked His disciples, saying, Who do men say Me to be, the Son of Man?
Mat 16:14  And they said, Some say, John the Baptist; some, Elijah; and others, Jeremiah, or one of the prophets.
Mat 16:15  He said to them, But who do you say I am?
Mat 16:16  And Simon Peter answered and said, You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.
Mat 16:17  Jesus answered and said to him, You are blessed, Simon, son of Jonah, for flesh and blood did not reveal it to you, but My Father in Heaven.
Mat 16:18  And I also say to you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build My church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.
Mat 16:19  And I will give the keys of the kingdom of Heaven to you. And whatever you may bind on earth shall occur, having been bound in Heaven, and whatever you may loose on earth shall occur, having been loosed in Heaven. 

Years later, Jesus finally told them all WHY he gave him the name Peter.  Not a contradiction at all- For John, the what was important, for Peter, it was the why.