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Misquoting Jesus with Bart Ehrman

Who Really Wrote the Gospel of John?

Misquoting Jesus with Bart Ehrman

Chris Huntley

Christianity, History, Religion & Spirituality

4.8745 Ratings

🗓️ 2 January 2024

⏱️ 48 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Almost everyone assumes that Jesus' disciple, John the Son of Zebedee, wrote the Gospel of John. But is there any compelling reason to think so? In this episode we look into many of the issues that most people have never thought about. Most, for example, do not realize that the author of this book never mentions John, let alone calls himself John. There is a person called "The Disciple Jesus loved" (mentioned in none of the other Gospels). But who is he? Why would anyone think he is John? Is it possible he's not a real person at all? Is, as often claimed, the author claiming that it is he himself? (Bart will explain: No.) Apart from that, is it even possible that the historical John -- an Aramaic-speaking peasant called "illiterate" in the NT itself (Acts 4;13) -- could have written such a magnificent book? Could he possibly have used a secretary. If not ... who did write the book? Tune in and see!

Transcript

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0:00.0

Welcome to Misquoting Jesus with Bart Ehrman.

0:07.0

The only show, where a six-time New York Times best-selling author and world-renowned Bible scholar

0:13.0

uncovers the many fascinating, little-known facts about the New Testament, the historical Jesus, and the rise of Christianity. I'm your host, Megan Lewis. Let's

0:23.6

begin. Hello everyone and welcome back to misquoting Jesus. Today we are talking about the gospel of

0:30.8

John, which is typically attributed to the beloved disciple, John the son of Zebedee. Why was this

0:36.8

particular John, out of all of the Johns in the

0:39.1

Bible, selected as the author, was John, son of Zebedee, even the beloved disciple, and could

0:44.3

someone else entirely have written the gospel? Before we get into that, we will have a quick chat,

0:50.1

Bart, happy new year. How are you? Here we are. Okay, new year, you know, new possibilities and hopefully a better reality for the world in general.

1:00.0

I'm pumped because, as I probably have said before, I'm on leave this semester and sabbatical to give me some time to write the next book.

1:08.4

The problem with this kind of situation, every colleague I have ever had has a situation they have a leave for a semester or for a year to write a book. And they think they've got so much time. And so they start reading and they read this. And they think, oh, that's interesting. And they kind of find this. By the time, you know, a month left and then they realize, oh, my God, I haven't started writing yet. I have a whole book. Freaking out. And so I'm pretty disciplined about these things, and I don't know if I'll be able to get this thing written, but I'm sure going to try. You know, people wonder like, you mean, you don't have to work for six months? What kind of job is this again? How do I get that? Yeah, it isn't

1:46.3

really like that. It's like it's still, oh my God, it's just so much work. So happy New Year to

1:51.1

How are things looking for you? Looking forward. Good, actually. Everyone is obviously still off

1:56.7

school, so they are running around, causing absolute chaos, having the time of their lives,

2:01.9

generally enjoying the fact that they don't have to leave the house.

2:05.5

So, yeah, they're having a great time, and I'm enjoying having them all home.

2:09.8

It's really, really enjoyable.

2:11.4

You know, my sense is that, you know, when you have kids that are running around having

2:17.1

the time of your life, it's not like not

2:19.1

having kids with people around you running around that.

2:23.4

People who don't have kids are like, oh my God, these people are nuisance.

2:26.9

I mean, when I had my kids, I thought, well, wow, that's great.

...

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