John 21:1-25

Appendix: 21:1-25.

After the conclusion John 20:30-31, this section is a surprise to the reader. It contains two scenes: one of a general interest for the whole circle of the disciples (John 21:1-14); the other of a more special interest, having reference to the two principal apostles (John 21:15-23). It ends with a new conclusion, the appendix, John 21:24-25.

The composition of this section must be later than that of the gospel; this appears, 1, from the formula of conclusion at the end of the preceding chapter; and, 2, from the connection which we have proved between the conversation of Jesus with Thomas and the general plan of the book. Some Hengstenberg, Lange, Hoeleman, Hilgenfeld, etc. have sought to efface the final point, set by the author himself in the passage John 20:30-31.

Lange seeks to make us regard ch. 21 as an epilogue serving as a counterpart to the prologue John 1:1-18. “In the same way,” he says (Life of Jesus, iv. p. 752), “as the evangelist has represented in ch. 1 the ante-historic reign of Christ,...in the same way he now draws the picture of His post-historic reign, even to the end of the world.” But this comparison is more ingenious than real. It is the apostles who are on the stage in the following narrative, much more than the Lord Himself; and it is their future destiny which is here foretold, rather than the reign of the glorified Lord which is described. The counterpart of the prologue, from the point of view indicated by Lange, is not ch. 21; it is the Apocalypse. Weitzel has made a remark which seems to me to have scarcely any better foundation. “Each of the other three Gospels,” he says, “closes with a section relative to the future activity of the apostles; comp. Matthew 28:19-20; Mark 16:20; Luke 24:53. Chapter 21 has the same part in our Gospel.”

It is evident that Jesus, after having risen from the dead, speaks to the apostles in each Gospel respecting their coming work. But such words differ too widely from ch. 21 of John for any one to be able to draw a conclusion from this fact.

This appendix was certainly composed after the Gospel; but it must have been composed soon enough to have made it possible to add it to the principal work before the latter was put in circulation in the Church. Otherwise there would undoubtedly have been formed, as for the Gospel of Mark, two classes of copies, one not having the appendix, the other drawing its material from the manuscript in which it had been originally inserted. It is, therefore, between the time of the composition of the Gospel and that of its publication that we must place the redaction and addition of this chapter.

Renan gives nearly the same judgment: “I close the first redaction,” he says, “at the end of ch. 20. Chapter 21 is a nearly contemporaneous addition, either of the author himself or of his disciples” (p. 534). This date is confirmed by the passage which contains the words relative to the future of John (John 21:21-23). We have seen this (Introd., Vol. I., pp. 166, 167); it is at the time when the death of John, quite recent or foreseen as imminent, seemed to contradict the well-known promise of Jesus, that the correction contained in this passage must have appeared necessary. This fact fixes the date of our chapter. Only we need not infer from this, with Weiss, Reuss and others, that this correction was the sole purpose of the redaction and of the addition of the entire chapter. Two reasons oppose this: 1. The preamble, John 21:1-20, which would be too considerable; 2 Thessalonians 1 4th verse, which too distinctly separates the two parts of the narrative. On the author of this appendix, see at John 21:25.

In the appearance, John 20:19-23, Jesus had conferred on the disciples their mission. In the first scene of ch. 21 that which concerns the seven disciples, John 21:1-14

He gives them a forever ineffaceable sign of the magnificent success assured to this mission, so far as they shall work in it under His direction.