drg55 wrote: ↑Sun Dec 21, 2014 3:11 am
Ehrman goes on to say that its twelve because each will rule one of the twelve tribes of Israel in the apocalypse.
It does pay to check references, I looked them up and listed them off and only found a second Judas in Luke, whereas in John there is a Nathaniel
and the famous disciple Jesus Loved - he was either gay as suggested in the "Secret Gospel of Mark" which I take to be a hoax, or more likely it was Mary Magdalene.
The Beloved Disciple I believe is John, one of the main reasons being the identification in John 21 (about meeting the risen Jesus by the Sea of Galilee) :
7. Therefore that disciple whom Jesus love says to Peter, It is the Lord. Now when Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he girt his fisher"s coat to him, (for he was naked,) and did cast himself into the sea.
[Next, Peter meets and talks with the risen Jesus.]
20. Then Peter, turning about, sees the disciple whom Jesus loved following; which also leaned on his breast at supper, and said, Lord, which is he that betrays you?21. Peter seeing him says to Jesus, Lord, and what shall this man do?22. Jesus says to him, If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to you? follow you me. 23. Then went this saying abroad among the brethren, that that disciple should not die: yet Jesus said not to him, He shall not die; but, If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to you?
24. This is the disciple which testifies of these things, and wrote these things: and we know that his testimony is true.
Since this is the Gospel of John, it seems that the Beloved Disciple is John the apostle, whom Paul associated with Peter when he wrote in an epistle that Peter, James, and John were the three pillars of Jerusalem's church.
The Golden Chain commentary says that John recognized Jesus because of John's penetrating nature, and that Peter was naked just for work:
CHRYSOSTOM: The recognition of Him brings out Peter and John in their different tempers of mind; the one fervid, the other sublime; the one ready, the other penetrating. John is the first to recognize our Lord...
BEDE. The Evangelist alludes to himself here the same way he always does. He recognized our Lord either by the miracle, or by the sound of His voice, or the association of former occasions on which He found them fishing. Peter was naked in comparison with the usual dress he wore, in the sense in which we say to a person whom we meet thinly clad, You are quite bare. Peter was bare for convenience sake, as fishermen are in fishing.
THEOPHYLACT. Peter"s girding himself is a sign of modesty. He girt himself with a linen coat, such as Thamian and Tyrian fishermen throw over them, when they have nothing else on, or even over their other clothes.
I suppose that the nakedness could have had some metaphorical meaning, although I don't know what. The youth in the tomb in Mark 16 seems to have a white garment on as representing heavenly resurrection flesh.
Like Peter's nakedness in this passage, the love for the Beloved Disciple doesn't have to be sexual. The NT Greek has different kinds of love, like Agape love, which is like "Platonic" love. I love my cousins and plenty of people love their favorite bands and celebrities and heroes, but it doesn't mean it's sexual. Love is one of the main Christian and NT themes, like God's love to the world.