The Gospel of John’s date, compilation, audience, and purpose

Many scholars tend to date the Gospel of John late in the first century, with a few scholars maybe dating it as early as 60 AD. Also, there is the opinion that the Gospel of John was viewed as complementary to the other Gospels, no doubt owing to Euseubius’ account behind the Gospel of John (see Church History 3.24.7 and 6.14.7). However, I would contend that the Gospel is John is one of the earliest of the four canonical gospels, if not the earliest. Also, I would contend that the traditional stance that the Gospel of John was a complementary gospel does not fit within the purpose given and implied by the text.

First, one must understand that I believe that it is very credible that the disciples came to believe that Jesus was God, even as soon as the resurrection, as I explained here. My argument is in part based upon what I have laid out previously, and part of my argument for that was based upon John. So there is some circularity to my premise.

To get started, I think it is best to look at to what the Gospel says is its own purpose. John 20:31 says “these are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah (christos), the Son of God” (NRSV; parenthetical comment mine). If we can take John 20:31 to be part of the original compilation (another topic I will address a bit later), then evangelism becomes the primary purpose of the Gospel, not merely to be a supplement. Not only does the verse show it to be evangelistic in purpose, but seems the very gospel was meant to be given (probably through reading) to people who did not believe Jesus as the Messiah, the Son of God. A supplementary view would see the Gospel as being more geared towards where Christian tradition was already established, which John 20:31 seems to deny.

But to who then was the gospel directed? John 20:31 implies this somewhat by referring to Jesus as the Messiah and the Son of God. The former was a particularly Jewish title. The latter was a more Gentile phrase, although it wasn’t foreign to Jewish tradition. Augustus was called the son of god (although it referred to being the son of the deified Julius Caesar). So, it seems that the Gospel may have been geared towards both Jews and Gentiles. This is further supported by the transalation of the Jewish messias into the Gentile christos in John 1:41. And then John 3:16 refers to the Son being the source of life for the “world”, which is a message that  the Gentiles are included. But then there are particular Jewish elements throughout the Gospel, such as the reference to “I am” in John 8:58. I think the evidence supports that the Gospel was intended for Jews and Geniltes alike.

Also, the introduction of John the Baptist seems to imply a lack of familiarity withim him assumed in the audience. Matthew and Mark both immediately refer to John the Baptist without any introductory statements abotu him. Luke introduces him by referring to the events surrounding his birth, but his account seems to be geareds towards a particular individual. But the way of introducing John the Baptist in the Gospel of the John in John 1:6 seems to assume there is an unfamiliarity with him. This allows us to speculate that the Gospel was not geared towards people in Israel, who would have bene familiar with the executed roaming prophet. Nor would it have been sent to people who had the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, or Luke, as they would have already had familiarity with John the Baptist.

Combining this with the fact that the gospel seems to be intended for both Jews and Gentiles, it is likely this gospel was directed toward diasporic Jews living throughout the Roman Empire along with the rest of the people of the Empire. I would hypothesize that as Christianity began to focus its missionary efforts outside of Israel, there came to be a need for an evangelistic presentation of Jesus that would speak to both the Jews and Gentiles. The Gospel of John was compiled, I would say, for that very purpose.

And if indeed, the gospel was intended for diaspora Jews, then the Gospel would in all likelihood not be first compiled and used later in the first century. As Christian evangelism increased to the Jewish communities abroad, there would have been slowly growing tensions between Christians and the Jews who did not believe Jesus was the Messiah, the christos (perhaps reflected by Suetonius explaining the expulsion of the Jews from Rome being about a person named Chrestus). By the late first century AD, Christians and Jews would have perhaps been more hostile towards each other (Romans 11:20-21 reflects the beginnings of this tension) and evangelistic efforts would then begin to cease towards the Jews (although, I have no historical eveidence to affirm, or deny, this attitude in the later first century. It is more speculation).

Now when I speak of the gospel being compiled, I say that based upon how I believe the Gospel came to be formed. I would hypothesize that the Gospel as we have it went through a minimum of four stages:

1) John writes the stories about Jesus’ miracles, maybe even to supplement some of the Christian communities tradition for those in Israel (thus maybe explaining Euseubius’ account).

2) An editor comes by and compiles the stories in the present order they are in (without John 7:53-8:11 and John 21), and adds John 1:1-19a, 3:16-21, 31-36 and 20:30-31 (and potentially elsewhere)

3) John 21 is later added to the Gospel due to questions about the authorial concerns of the stories and a certain tradition that may have thought “the disciple” would never die

4) John 7:53-8:11 was added to this compilation of stories, probably coming from another tradition that had spread about Jesus

I can not go into detail here for my rationale for this other than to hit at a basic explanation. John 7:53-8:11 is missing in some witnesses. John 21 is not missing, so it is probably an early addition. However, John chapter 20 seems to be a fitting end for the gospel (compare 20:20 with 1:1), and if the other factors I believe point to an early dating, chapter 21 makes no little sense unless it is added sometime after Peter’s death. As for an editor, if Matthew, Mark, and Luke are correct, the cleansing of the temple happened later. And if John was written earlier, the disciple would have been more likely to know that it would have happened later in his ministry. Hence, an outside editor without a thorough knowledge is a more plausible editor and compiler.

But the placing of the temple cleansing where it is in the narrative also gives us another hint as to the time writing of the Gospel of the John. If the gospel was supplementary material, then it makes little sense for the gospel to porray the Temple cleansing happening chronologically as early as it did. However, if the gospel is written earlier, it would make more sense for it to be placed where it is in the narrative. Early after Jesus’ ministry, there would have perhaps been tradition that would have spread about the things Jesus had done and said, but a chronological tradition would probably have not been developed early on. We see the attempt to form a chronological order when we compared Matthew, Mark, and Luke with each other. But the Gospel of John was written earlier, much earlier than those three gospels, then it is feasible to think that a chronological tradition had yet to develop that placed the Temple cleansing right before Jesus’ death.

Finally, if the notion that Jesus was God was an early reflection that the stories of John actually portray (and so form as a natural argument for Jesus being God), then we would begin to postulate an earlier authorship also. As I have stated previously in my post about how Jesus could have come to be seen as God, I believe that Jesus was attributed the title of God after his resurrection. But as time passed, the title of Jesus was slowly changed in order to avoid confusion with God the Father, YHWH. This eventually led to the title of “Lord” being used for Jesus. But before that, Jesus title would move from ho theos (as in John 20:31) to simple theos (as in John 1:1), where the lack of the article served to dissipate any confusion between the Father and the Son.

If Paul’s writing in 1 Corinthians 8:6 represents an early creed identifying Jesus as Lord, and yet attributing to him God-like qualities (qualities that are synonymous with being the logos of John 1:1-3), then we may can speculate the Gospel of John being dated a little before 1 Corinthians. But it would probably have to be after the mission to evangelize the Gentiles was in full force. I would guess around 50 AD, maybe a bit earlier.

This is my theory so far, up for being adapted as I continue to study the Gospel of John in more detail with the questions of audience, purpose, and compilation in mind. And while this may seem like a more extreme estimate at to the dating of the Gospel of John, I think it makes the most sense of what I have looked at so far witihin the gospel (allowing that I may have missed important clues to dating that would point to a later date). It is based on some assumptions and circularity also, but my hope is to as I study it further, to be able to either continue to affirm this hypothesis while reducing the assumptions and circular reasoning, or to come up with a better theory to explain all the different factors.