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31. ταῦτα δέ. But these (signs). On the one hand there were many unrecorded; but on the other hand some have been recorded. And these are all signs: every act has been significant. It was not S. John’s purpose to write a complete ‘Life of Christ;’ it was not his purpose to write a ‘Life’ at all. Rather he would narrate just those facts respecting Jesus which would produce a saving faith in Him as the Messiah and the Son of God. S. John’s work is ‘a Gospel and not a biography’: most imperfect as a biography, it is ‘complete as a Gospel.’
ἴνα πιστεύητε. That those who read this record may be convinced of two things,—identical in the Divine counsels, identical in fact, but separate in the thoughts of men,—(1) that Jesus, the well-known Teacher and true man, is the Christ, the long looked for Messiah and Deliverer of Israel, the fulfiller of type and prophecy; (2) that He is also the Son of God, the Divine Word and true God. Were He not the latter He could not be the former, although men have failed to see this. Some had been looking for a mere Prophet and Wonder-worker,—a second Moses or a second Elijah; others had been looking for an earthly King and Conqueror,—a second David or a second Solomon. These views were all far short of the truth, and too often obscured and hindered the truth. Jesus, the Lord’s Anointed, must be and is—not only very man but very God: 1Jn 4:14-15. This truth is worth having for its own sake; but, as S. John’s experience had taught him, to possess it is to possess eternal life: 1Jn 5:13, a passage which seems to shew that the object of the Epistle is similar to that of the Gospel as here set forth. see on Joh 3:36. For ἐν τῷ ὀνόματι αὐτοῦ see on Joh 1:12. The conclusion of the Gospel is an echo of the beginning (Joh 1:4; Joh 1:12); and it once more gives a flat contradiction to Gnostic teaching. (1) Jesus is no mere man to whom a divine being was for a time united, but the Messiah and very God. (2) Eternal life is to be obtained, not by intellectual enlightenment, but by faith in the name of Jesus. Comp. Act 4:10; 1Co 6:11.
It is quite manifest that this was in the first instance intended as the end of the Gospel. The conflict between belief and unbelief recorded in it reaches a climax in the confession of S. Thomas and the Beatitude which follows: the work appears to be complete; and the Evangelist abruptly but deliberately brings it to a close. What follows is an afterthought, added by S. John’s own hand, as the style and language sufficiently indicate, but not part of the original plan. There is nothing to shew how long an interval elapsed before the addition was made, nor whether the Gospel was ever published without it. The absence of evidence as to this latter point favours the view that the Gospel was not given to the world until after the appendix was written.