The end of the fourth gospel sets the scene with Peter turning and looking at the one whom Jesus loved. Peter ask Jesus why he has not asked this person to follow him, as he has Peter. Jesus replies with “If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is it to you?” The ‘he’ that Jesus is referring to is the beloved disciple. The second to last set of verses in John, does not provide an answer the question of who this Beloved Disciple is, but only raises more. In this essay, I will explore the identity of the Beloved Disciple, and by doing this, also examining the authorship of the gospel. The beloved disciple is a character who is not explicitly named in the fourth gospel. He makes several different appearances within the gospel, but
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Not many scholars dare to explore this possibility and don’t pay much attention or effort researching this. The beloved disciple is someone who is portrayed as an intimate person who completely understands God’s and Jesus’ intentions (more on that later). “According to Brown, the Fourth Gospel was authored by an anonymous follower of Jesus referred to in the Gospel text as the Beloved Disciple. This Beloved Disciple knew Jesus personally and was in the originating group of the Johannine Community (Brown 1979: 31),” (beloveddisciple.org). The way that the beloved disciple and Peter interact is in an “one-upmanship” fashion. Jusino suggests that these actions would be consistent with the relationship between Mary Magdalene and Peter. He uses the reference ‘in the Nag Hamadi Corpus,’ to compare these two and their attitudes towards each other. One thing that does ring true with this hypothesis is the way that Jesus talks about his mother; whenever that might be. Jesus speaks and expects different things from the beloved disciple rather than from his 12 disciples, as well as Mary Magdalene. If they were the same person, that could explain the reason for this. However, an obvious flaw in this hypothesis, is the scene where Jesus gives his mother to the beloved disciple. He wouldn’t give her to herself; that wouldn’t make any sense. There are a few logical ways in which Mary Magdalene can be considered the beloved disciple, however not many scriptural or textural facts to create even a strong
Not many scholars dare to explore this possibility and don’t pay much attention or effort researching this. The beloved disciple is someone who is portrayed as an intimate person who completely understands God’s and Jesus’ intentions (more on that later). “According to Brown, the Fourth Gospel was authored by an anonymous follower of Jesus referred to in the Gospel text as the Beloved Disciple. This Beloved Disciple knew Jesus personally and was in the originating group of the Johannine Community (Brown 1979: 31),” (beloveddisciple.org). The way that the beloved disciple and Peter interact is in an “one-upmanship” fashion. Jusino suggests that these actions would be consistent with the relationship between Mary Magdalene and Peter. He uses the reference ‘in the Nag Hamadi Corpus,’ to compare these two and their attitudes towards each other. One thing that does ring true with this hypothesis is the way that Jesus talks about his mother; whenever that might be. Jesus speaks and expects different things from the beloved disciple rather than from his 12 disciples, as well as Mary Magdalene. If they were the same person, that could explain the reason for this. However, an obvious flaw in this hypothesis, is the scene where Jesus gives his mother to the beloved disciple. He wouldn’t give her to herself; that wouldn’t make any sense. There are a few logical ways in which Mary Magdalene can be considered the beloved disciple, however not many scriptural or textural facts to create even a strong