Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadHeinrich Meyer Commentary - John 21
Verse Commentaries:
Chapter Level Commentary:
After πλοῖον , Elz. Griesb. Secholz have: εὐθύς , which is condemned by decisive testimony.
Joh_21:4. γενομ .] Tisch.: γινομ ., which is to be preferred, since to the witnesses C.* E. L., A. B. with γεινομ . are to be added; though with the copyists γενομ . was more current.
εἰς ] Lachm. Tisch.: ἐπί . The Codd. are very much divided; ἐπί came to be more readily added as a gloss than εἰς . Comp. Mat_13:2; Mat_13:48; Act_21:5.
Joh_21:6. ἴσχυσαν ] Tisch.: ἴσχυον , according to preponderant testimonies. The aorist form was involuntarily suggested from the surrounding context ( ἔβαλον , ἑλκῦσαι ).
Joh_21:11. ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς ] Lachm. Tisch.: εἰς τὴν γῆν , according to A. B. C. L. à ., etc. Nevertheless, the Recepta is to be retained. ʼΕπὶ τὴν γ . (so D. Curss.) was written as a gloss in some instances,—in others, after Joh_21:9, εἰς τ . γ . was written.
In Joh_21:15-17, as in Joh_1:43, instead of Ἰωνᾶ , we are to read: Ἰωάννου .
Joh_21:17. πρόβατα ] A. B. C.: προβάτια . Rightly adopted by Tisch. The Recepta is a repetition from Joh_21:16. Tisch. has, indeed, even already in Joh_21:16, προβάτια , but only according to B. C., so that the testimony of A. appears first for Joh_21:17.
Joh_21:22. Read with Lachm. Tisch., μοι ἀκολούθει .
Joh_21:25 is wanting in à .*, is explained in Scholia as an addition, aud has in detail the variations ἅ (Lachm. Tisch.) instead of ὅσα ; Χριστὸς Ἰησοῦς (D.), in one Cod. of It. with the addition: quae non scripta in hoc libro; οὐδʼ (Laehm. Tisch.) instead of οὐδέ ; χωρήσειν (Tisch. according to B. C.* à .** Or.); at the conclusion ἀμήν (Elz.).
Chap. Joh_20:30-31, bears so obviously the stamp of a formal conclusion worthy of an apostle, while chap. 21, moreover, begins in a manner so completely unexpected, that this chap, can appear only as a supplement. The question is, however,[273] whether this supplement proceeds from John or not. This question first became a subject of investigation from the time of Grotius, who saw in the chapter a supplement of the Ephesian church, composed after the apostle’s death by the bishop (perhaps by John the Presbyter). Since all witnesses contain the chapter, a judgment can only be pronounced from internal grounds. These, however, decide only against Joh_21:25, which contains an exaggeration so surprising, unapostolical, and in such absolute contradiction to the Johannean simplicity, intelligence, and delicacy, that it is impossible that it can have proceeded from the pen of the apostle, but must appear probably as a later, although very ancient, form of conclusion, an apocryphal and inharmonious echo of Joh_20:30. The omission[274] of Joh_21:25 in à *, and its suspicious character in the Scholia, rests upon a correct critical feeling. On such feeling, however, also rests the fact that this omission and suspicion have not likewise affected Joh_21:24, which throughout contains nothing that John could not have written, but rather forms a worthy conclusion to the entire supplement of chap. 21, and does not by οἴδαμεν betray the work of a strange hand (see the exegetical notes). The grounds, moreover, brought forward against the authenticity of Joh_21:1-23 are untenable. For (1) it by no means follows from Joh_21:23, that at the time of the composition the apostle was already dead (Weizsäcker, Keim, and others), since the speech there mentioned required the correct historical explanation precisely for the eventuality of his death, which was still future. Comp. Ewald, Jahrb. III. p. 172. (2) The advent of Christ, mentioned in Joh_21:22-23, is without any reason declared to be non-Johannean. See on Joh_14:3. Just as little is (3) the self-designation, Joh_21:20, un-Johannean; it corresponds rather just as well to the importance which the recollection, therein expressed, of the never-to-be-forgotten moment must have had for John, in and of itself, as also to the connection into which it is interwoven. See on Joh_21:20. Further, (4) the individual expressions[275] which are designated as non-Johannean (as e.g. Joh_21:3, ἔρχεσθαι σύν instead of ἀκολουθεῖν ; Joh_21:4, πρωΐας γινομ . instead of πρωΐ ; Joh_21:12, τολμᾶν and ἐξετάζειν ; Joh_21:18, φέρειν instead of ἄγΕΙΝ ) are, taken together, phenomena so unessential, nay, having for the most part in the sense of the context so natural a foundation, that they, especially in consideration of the later time of the composition of the supplement, do not leave at all any serious difficulty behind them, and are far outweighed by the otherwise completely Johannean stamp, which the composition bears in itself, in the language, in the mode of presentation, and in the individual features which betray the eye-witness (how entirely different is the section concerning the adulteress!). For, in particular, (5) the alleged want of Johannean clearness and demonstrativeness is removed partly by correct exposition, partly in the question as to the genuineness, rendered ineffective by the fact that John, even in the earlier part of the Gospel, does not always narrate with equal clearness and demonstrativeness. (6) It is not correct to say that with the spurious conclusion the entire chapter also falls to the ground,[276] since the non-Johannean conclusion may have been added to the Johannean chapter, especially as, on the assumption to be made of the genuineness of Joh_21:24, the appendix itself did not proceed without a conclusion from the hand of the apostle. In accordance with all that has been advanced, the view is justified, that John by way of authentic historical explanation of the legend in Joh_21:23, some time after finishing his Gospel, which he had closed with Joh_20:31, wrote chap. Joh_21:1-24,[277] as a complement of the book, and that this appendix, simply because its Johannean origin was immediately certain and recognised, already at a very early period, whilst the Gospel had not yet issued forth from the narrower circle of its first readers (Einl. sec. 5), had become an inseparable part of the Gospel; but that simply owing to the fact that now the entire book was without a principal conclusion, the apocryphal conclusion, Joh_21:25, exaggerating the original conclusion, Joh_20:31, came to be added. This addition of Joh_21:25 must have been made at a very early date, because only a few isolated traces of the spuriousness of Joh_21:25 have been preserved, which, however, by the evidence of à .* go back to a very ancient time; while, on the other hand, in reference to Joh_21:1-24, not the faintest echo of a critical tradition is found which would have testified against the genuineness. Tisch. also designates only Joh_21:25 as spurious.
The apostolic origin of the chapter was controverted, amid the setting forth of very different theories, especially its derivation from the author of the Gospel, after Grotius, by Clericus, Hammond, Semler, Paulus, Gurlitt (Lection. im N. T. Spec. III., Hamb. 1805), Bertholdt, Seyffarth (Beitr. zur Specialcharakt. der Joh. Schriften, Lpz. 1823, p. 271 ff.), Lücke, Schott, De Wette, Credner, Wieseler (Diss. 1839: John the Presbyter wrote the chap, after the death of the apostle), Schweizer, Bleek, Schwegler, Zeller, Baur (because it is not in keeping with the main idea of the whole), Kostlin, Keim, Scholten, and several others; Brückner has doubts. In opposition to Baur’s school, according to which it is said to be designed, along with the entire chap., for the purpose of exalting the apostle of Asia Minor over Peter, see especially Bleek.
The Johannean origin, or at least the derivation from the writer of the Gospel, is defended, but in such a way that recently Joh_21:24-25 have been for the most part rejected by Calovius, Rich. Simon, Mill, Wetstein, Lampe, Michaelis, Krause (Diss. Viteb. 1793), Beck (Lips. 1795), Eichhorn, Kuinoel, Hug, Wegscheider (Einl. in d. Ev. Joh.), Handschke (de αὐθεντίᾳ c. 21 ev. Joh. e sola orat. indole dijud., Lips. 1818), Erdmann (Bemerk. üb. Joh., Rostock 1821), Weber (authentia … argumentor. intern. usu vindic., Hal. 1823), Guerike, Redding (Disput. Groning. 1833), Frommann, Tholuck, Olshausen, Klee, Maier, B. Crusius (not decidedly),[278] in the Stud. u. Krit. 1849, p. 601 ff., Luthardt, Lange, Laurillard (Disp. L. B. 1853), Ebrard (on Olshausen), Hengstenberg, Godet, Hoelemann, Schleiermacher (at least in respect of the contents). According to Ewald (l.c., comp. also Jahrb. X. p. 87), a friend of the apostle (probably a presbyter at Ephesus), of whose hand, probably also of whose art, John availed himself in the composition of the Gospel, wrote the appendix for himself alone at a later date, without desiring in the slightest degree to conceal that it was by a different individual. In his Johann. Schriften, I. p. 54 ff., Ewald ascribes the composition to the same circle of friends, in which the Gospel may have remained perhaps for ten years before its publication; that the apostle himself, however, permitted the publication with this appendix (inclusive also of Joh_21:24-25) before his death. Similarly Baeumlein.
Very superficially and peremptorily does Hengstenberg designate the entire view that chap. 21 is a supplement, as leading to a view of the accidental nature of the authorship, which is unworthy of the apostle, and in conflict with the character of the Gospel. Hilgenfeld assigns the chap., with inclusion of Joh_21:24-25, to the evangelist, who, however, was not the apostle. Comp. also Bretschneider, p. 182.
[273] See generally Hoelemann, der Epilog des Evang. Joh., in his Bibelstudien, II. p. 61 ff.
[274] According to the usual statement, ver. 25 should also be wanting in Cod. 63. This, however, Tisch. (Wann wurden unsere Evangelien verf. p. 127, ed. 4) declares to be an error. On ver. 25 in à . Tisch. passes this judgment: the copyist of this Cod. did not find the verse in his copy, and therefore did not add it; but the words are supplied, “ab eo qui eadem aetate totum librum recensebat ac passim ex alio exemplari corrigebat atque augebat,” Cod. à . ed. Lips. p. LIX.
[275] For a minute discussion of the peculiarities of language in chap. 21, and their variation from the Gospel, see in Tiele, Annotatio in locos nonnull. ev. Joh. ad vindicand. huj. ev. authent., Amst. 1853, p. 115 ff. In answer to Scholten, who believes he has found most linguistie deviations, see Hilgenfeld in his ZeitsChr. 1868, p. 441 ff.
[276] Much more correct would it be to say: the chap. partially betrays, in so striking a manner, the Johannean delicacy and originality (pre-eminently vv. 15–17), that the whole stands along with it as a production of the apostle.
[277] Vv. 1–14 hardly have an object unknown to us (Brückner), since they are in simple objective historical connection with what follows.
[278] He, as also Lange, Hengstenberg, Hoelemann, ascribes also vv. 24, 25 to the apostle, in opposition to which Luthardt regards 24, 25 as a testimony added from the Ephesian church.