St. John the Beloved, Apostle and Evangelist

Praise for the loved disciple,
exile on Patmos' shore;
Praise for the faithful record,
he to Thy Godhead bore,
Praise for the mystic vision
through him to us revealed.
May we, in patience waiting,
with Thine elect be sealed.

St. John the Apostle makes his first appearance in the Gospels as a fisherman, working alongside his brother James and father Zebedee at the Sea of Galilee. Our Lord arrives at the seashore and gets in Peter’s boat, from where He begins to preach. Afterward, He instructs Peter to “put out into the deep” with the result being the miraculous draught of fish. Peter and his brother Andrew, with whom he is working, call to James and John, described by St. Luke as their partners in the fishing business, to help them haul in the catch, which was so huge that not only were the nets about to rip but the boats were in danger of sinking. Our Lord then calls Peter, Andrew, James and John to be disciples, saying that they will be “fishers of men.”

"Come and See"

It is possible, of course, that Jesus had never met the two sets of brothers before this day. However, the Gospel according to St. John presents a different version of the calls of Peter, Andrew and John. Here, after Jesus’ baptism (which St. John does not record), St. John the Baptist tells two of his disciples. “Behold the Lamb of God!” as Jesus walked by them. One of these disciples is identified as Andrew while the other is left unnamed. They go to Jesus and ask Him were He is staying, to which Our Lord responds, “Come and see.” The details in the passage, such as the mention of the time of day, have led scholars to conclude for a long time that the unnamed disciple is John, as the time of day is a detail that only a person who was present for the event is likely to remember. It also shows what a profound impact meeting Our Lord had on the two disciples.

After staying with Jesus for the day, Andrew finds his brother Peter and brings him to Christ. (It is unclear why John did not do the same with his own brother) In the Gospel according to St. John, this is presented as the call of Peter, Andrew and John, but there is no contradiction between accounts. St. Luke, not having been an eyewitness to these events, would have interviewed others and thus may not have had knowledge of the original meeting. Either way, Our Lord definitively calls John at the Sea of Galilee and Gospel according to St. Luke makes a point of stating that they left not only their boats and nets but their father Zebedee as well. This would have been a huge deal in the Jewish culture at the time and it is interesting to note that, unlike their mother Salome, there is no mention of Zebedee after this point in the Gospel.

"Son of Thunder"

Our Lord, at the highpoint of His ministry, had thousands of followers but not all of those could be considered “disciples.” Disciple comes from discipulus meaning student. Although Our Lord was teaching whenever He spoke to the crowds, in Second Temple Judaism a disciple had a much closer relationship with his rabbi than simply going to hear him speak. The Gospel according to St. Luke records Our Lord commissioning and sending out seventy-two disciples to preach, proclaim the Kingdom of God, and cast out demons.   These seventy-two are not named, so it is unclear whether the Twelve Apostles were separate from these or were taken from among their number. At any rate, the Twelve Apostles were Our Lord’s inner circle with a further innermost circle consisting of Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, later nicknamed “sons of Thunder” by Our Lord.

As one of the “Big Three,” St. John was present for events that the rest of the Twelve were not, including (but likely not limited to) the raising of the daughter of Jairus, the Transfiguration of Our Lord and the Agony in the Garden of Gethsemane. Although Peter is well-known for his impetuousness, apparently both James and John had a temper, at least to some degree. When the Twelve return after Our Lord sends them out, John is the one who tells Him of another exorcist who was casting out demons in the name of Jesus, whom they order to stop. (Mark 9:38) Only verses later, Our Lord gives the two brothers the nickname “Sons of Thunder” after they asked Him if He wished for them to call down fire from Heaven on a Samaritan town that had refused to allow them to stay there on their way to Jerusalem. 

Nor were John, along with his brother James, without some ambition, since they asked Our Lord to grant that they each sit at His right and left hand respectively in His Kingdom (although the Gospel according to St. Matthew ascribes this request to their mother Salome). Our Lord’s response asking them if they are willing to drink the Chalice that He is to drink is interesting, considering that James would go on to be the first Apostle to suffer martyrdom and John would be the last to die, of old-age.

St. John in the Passion Narratives

John takes a more distinct and developed role when Our Lord embarks on His Passion. In the Synoptic Gospels, Our Lord sends two disciples, first to acquire the donkey upon which He will ride as He enters Jerusalem and later to make arrangements to prepare the Upper Room for the Last Supper. St. Luke states that the two disciples whom Our Lord sent to rent the room were Peter and John, so it is logical to conclude that they were also the two whom He sent to get the donkey.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, as he is writing about events he experienced himself, St. John offers further details about his role in the Passion narrative in the Gospel that bears his name. In all these instances, he is not named but from the earliest centuries the tradition of the Church has identified the “disciple whom Jesus loved” and references to “another disciple” as referring to St. John, who left himself unnamed out of humility. At the Last Supper, when Our Lord foretells His betrayal, Peter has John who “was lying close to the breast of Jesus” (John 13:23) ask Our Lord who is the one who will betray Him. After Our Lord is arrested, all the Apostles scatter but Peter and John follow at a distance. Since John was “known to the High Priest,” he is allowed to enter the house where Our Lord is being held and has enough influence to have Peter admitted to the courtyard, where his denial occurs.

John reappears “standing by the cross of Jesus” (19:25) along with Our Lady, Mary the wife of Clopas and Mary Magdalene. The Gospel according to St. Matthew mentions that John’s own mother was also present. Since the Gospel according to St. Mark mentions Salome as also present, the general conclusion has been that the “mother of the sons of Zebedee” was named Salome. It is John to whom Our Lord is referring when He says to His Mother, “Woman, behold Thy Son” and He entrusts Our Lady to the care of St. John with the words “Behold thy Mother.”

Sts. Peter and John

After Our Lord’s burial, John is once again paired with Peter, when Mary Magdalene comes to them with the report of the sepulcher being empty. John and Peter run to the tomb, with John arriving first but waiting for Peter to enter the tomb. St. John states that “he saw and believed” (20:8) upon looking in the empty tomb and seeing Our Lord’s burial clothes. Later, John, along with his brother James, goes fishing with Peter, Thomas, Nathanael, and two other disciples (most likely Andrew and Philip) on the Lake of Tiberias (a.k.a. Sea of Galilee) when Our Risen Lord appears on the shore and repeats the miracle of the miraculous draught of fish. It is John who first recognizes Our Lord and tells Peter, who then leaps into the water and swims to shore. Later, as Our Lord is speaking to Peter and telling him “by what death he was to glorify God,” Peter turns and sees John following them. He asks Our Lord what John’s fate will be, to which Our Lord answers “If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you?” St. John then explains that this lead to a belief that he would not die until the return of Christ, which he attempts to dispel by pointing out that Our Lord never actually said this would happen but that it was not Peter’s business one way or another.

Following Our Lord’s Ascension and the descent of the Holy Spirit at Pentecost, John continues to be paired with Peter, apparently as second-in-command. Peter and John heal the crippled man by the Beautiful Gate of the Temple “in the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth” for which they are arrested and brought before the Sanhedrin. John also accompanies Peter to Samaria in order to confirm the converts who had been baptized by Philip (most likely NOT the Apostle). Following the martyrdom of his brother James, John is not mentioned again by name in the Acts of the Apostles, as the focus shifts from the original Twelve to the missionary journeys of St. Paul and his various companions.

After Acts and Apocalypse

According to tradition, St. John was arrested and brought to Rome where he was publicly thrown into a cauldron of boiling oil. He miraculously survived and was then sent into exile on the island of Patmos, where he received the visions that he would record in the Apocalypse. There is some debate over when these events occurred and thus with the dating of the Apocalypse. Traditionally, it was believed that this occurred during the last decade of the first century which was also the last decade of St. John’s life. This would have been during the reign of the emperor Domitian, who persecuted Christians because of their refusal to acknowledge him as deus et dominus (God and Lord). Before 1955, the Church commemorated the casting of St. John into boiling with the feast of St. John at the Latin Gate and most missals dated this event to A.D. 95. The Fathers of the Church stated that the Apocalypse “appeared” during the reign of Domitian; however, that does not necessarily mean that is when it was actually written

Domitian was eventually overthrown and assassinated in A.D. 96. He was the last of his dynasty (the Flavians) and was succeeded by the old and experienced Nerva. During Nerva’s reign John returned from his exile to Ephesus, where he died of old age in either A.D. 98 or 99, during the reign of Trajan, Nerva’s successor. He is the only apostle to have not died as a martyr, though it was not for lack of trying on the part of the Romans. Another attempt on his life was made at Ephesus, where, according to legend, he was offered a chalice of poisoned wine, (perhaps to consecrate for Mass). He blessed the cup, neutralizing the poison, for which he is represented in iconography by chalice with a serpent coming out of it. More famously, St. John is also represented by the symbols of a scroll or book, for the Gospel he wrote, and an eagle, for the heights of theology to which the Gospel he wrote soars. With his death circa A.D. 99, the Apostolic Age of public revelation came to a close. 

 St. John the Beloved, Apostle and Evangelist, ora pro nobis!