Papias and the disciples of the Lord.

[perseusomega9]

No, you just want to uncritically accept the apostolic father's as history. But please expound on how your special pleading addresses Ben's text critical observations in the op.

[gmx]

If, then, any one came, who had been a follower of the elders, I questioned him in regard to the words of the elders,-what Andrew or what Peter said, or what was said by Philip, or by Thomas, or by James, or by John, or by Matthew, or by any other of the disciples of the Lord, and what things Aristion and the presbyter John, {the disciples of the Lord [in Greek mss., not in Syriac mss.]}, say.

Ben, sort of tangential to your OP (or perhaps not), Papias seems to be equating elders with "disciples of the Lord", in the first usage of disciples of the Lord, does he not? His use of the elder John or presbyter John (which one is correct?), if there are two Johns, doesn't seem to distinguish between them on title / seniority / category, only in grammatical usage. Do you agree with this?

Does Papias claim direct contact with either John, if there are indeed two that he mentions? If so, it seems odd that Papias needs to ask "anyone that came" what that John was saying (as I read it in English), given he could ask him himself. This suggests to me that he may have only been referring to a single John here, one that he did not know personally.

Just a naive thought.

[Ben C. Smith]

If, then, any one came, who had been a follower of the elders, I questioned him in regard to the words of the elders,-what Andrew or what Peter said, or what was said by Philip, or by Thomas, or by James, or by John, or by Matthew, or by any other of the disciples of the Lord, and what things Aristion and the presbyter John, {the disciples of the Lord [in Greek mss., not in Syriac mss.]}, say.

Ben, sort of tangential to your OP (or perhaps not), Papias seems to be equating elders with "disciples of the Lord", in the first usage of disciples of the Lord, does he not?

Yes, I think he does.

His use of the elder John or presbyter John (which one is correct?)....

Either or both. Presbyter is just the Greek word for elder, but it has also been turned into an English word of its own for ecclesiastical reasons.

...if there are two Johns, doesn't seem to distinguish between them on title / seniority / category, only in grammatical usage. Do you agree with this?

Not really, no. A huge distinction seems to be that the first list consists of people whose words Papias was interested in receiving in a final sense. The indirect questions ("what Andrew or Peter said, what Philip said," and so on) apply only to those first seven; if Papias wanted to know what Aristion and the elder John were saying, it was only because they were passing on what Andrew and Peter and the rest had said. By apposition, the content of "what" those men "said" (past tense) is also what John the elder and Aristion are saying (present tense). The effect is as if my great aunt, still alive, is telling me (present tense) what President Kennedy said (past tense) in 1962. Do you see what I mean? The first seven on the list said things; the next two (Aristion and John) are saying things. So it is more than just grammar. The separate grammar also points to separate degrees of contemporaneity with Papias.

Does Papias claim direct contact with either John, if there are indeed two that he mentions?

No. I think that is just an inference on Eusebius' part.

This suggests to me that he may have only been referring to a single John here, one that he did not know personally.

I think that he was referring to two separate Johns, and I think that he knew neither one of them personally. The first John was probably long since dead, no longer saying anything, while the second John was still alive, but not living in Papias' city, so he relied upon word of mouth from passersby to glean what he could of what this second John was saying. Furthermore, what this second John was saying included, according to Papias, the words of those disciples/elders, including the first John. This is the transmission of a tradition.

I admit, it is possible that calling the second John "the elder" is supposed to make us think of the first John, who is "one of the elders," but to my ear the first set of elders is called that simply because they are literally old and gone, while the second elder, John, is called that because it is a title of sorts for him (hence him being called "the elder" later on in Papias). What leads me away from this possibility is the past tense for the first one's speaking and the present tense for the second one's speaking. John could be the single exception, the one member of the former group still around while Papias is writing, but I have no reason to think so other than the common name.

[gmx]

Thanks Ben. I'll think on this a little while.

[Ben C. Smith]

Thanks Ben. I'll think on this a little while.

Sure, no problem.

[gmx]

I think that he was referring to two separate Johns, and I think that he knew neither one of them personally.

Ben, can you explain why you believe Papias did not know "the presbyter John" personally?

The following wording, at least in its translated English form, seems to naturally imply first hand knowledge.

This also the presbyter said: Mark having become the interpreter of Peter, wrote down accurately

Or does Papias contradict my assumption elsewhere?

[Ben C. Smith]

I think that he was referring to two separate Johns, and I think that he knew neither one of them personally.

Ben, can you explain why you believe Papias did not know "the presbyter John" personally?

The following wording, at least in its translated English form, seems to naturally imply first hand knowledge.

This also the presbyter said: Mark having become the interpreter of Peter, wrote down accurately

Or does Papias contradict my assumption elsewhere?

How does "the elder said" convey first-hand knowledge? I am not following.

At any rate, Eusebius says, "And Papias, of whom we are now speaking, confesses that he received the words of the apostles from those that followed them, but says that he was himself a hearer of Aristion and the presbyter John." This sounds like Papias personally heard the two, right? But then Eusebius immediately continues, "At least he mentions them frequently by name, and gives their traditions in his writings." This sounds like a concession: the only clue that Papias gave about hearing those two personally is that he mentioned them frequently by name. That is not enough for me. Anybody can quote people they do not personally know. I do it all the time.

That said, I think that the elder really existed, and that Aristion really existed, and that they were both contemporaneous with Papias (though doubtless older than he was). It is, therefore, hardly impossible that Papias personally met one or both at some point; I am not ruling that out. But the fact that Papias was inquiring of travelers (Eusebius, History of the Church 3.39.4: "if anyone came") as to what was being said does not inspire confidence in me that he was regularly attending to Aristion and the elder John in person.

[gmx]

Fair enough, and I do not wish to labor the point.

What I interpreted to be first hand knowledge in Papias' words comes from the usage... "this also the presbyter said". I might be splitting hairs, but if Papias received this information from others, would it not be more natural to say "The following I learned from Laveranues, a follower of the elder John: Mark having become the interpreter..." ?

Also, some translations use the wording "as the presbyter used to say", which conveys (to me at least) that it was something he'd heard the presbyter say many times over the years... or giving that kind of impression, anyway. Ben, I don't know if you can help with which translation is more accurate, with respect to that phrase?

As you point out in your OP, Aristion and the elder John still appear to be present, whereas the previously listed disciples of the Lord have expired. I wonder, given it's a lengthy passage, whether what Papias may have intended was:

"when I was visited by followers of the disciples, I inquired about the things the disciples had said, which supplemented the things I myself have learned from Aristion and the elder John".

I realise that's completely speculative.

[Ben C. Smith]

Fair enough, and I do not wish to labor the point.

What I interpreted to be first hand knowledge in Papias' words comes from the usage... "this also the presbyter said". I might be splitting hairs, but if Papias received this information from others, would it not be more natural to say "The following I learned from Laveranues, a follower of the elder John: Mark having become the interpreter..." ?

It would certainly have been helpful for Papias to have listed every traveler through Hieropolis and traced each separate chain of transmission on its own, name by name, sure. But did he do so? Eusebius says that the names of John and Aristion pop up a lot throughout the work; he says nothing about the names of the travelers.

Also, some translations use the wording "as the presbyter used to say", which conveys (to me at least) that it was something he'd heard the presbyter say many times over the years... or giving that kind of impression, anyway. Ben, I don't know if you can help with which translation is more accurate, with respect to that phrase?

Well, ἔλεγεν ("was saying") is in the imperfect tense, and "used to say" is a perfectly valid translation of the imperfect, which often implies either repeated or continuous action. But I think you are still hearing more than is actually there. This is what an online news article from 2005 about Bush's impending second presidency says at one point:

Never get too far ahead of your followers, FDR used to say, for you might look back and find that there is no one there. A few principles from history might help keep Bush from that fate.

Is the journalist saying or implying that he personally used to hear FDR saying this? In truth, verbs about other people saying things imply nothing about whether the speaker actually heard them say those things, no matter what tense the verb is in. "He used to say" just does not necessarily equate to "I used to hear from him (in person)."

[Ben C. Smith]

The attempts to make this present tense verb apply to a time already past with respect to Papias penning his five volumes are necessary only because it is hard to imagine Aristion and the elder John both having been disciples of the Lord and being still alive while Papias is writing; without such constraints, these two men can easily be alive at the time (which has been estimated to be as early as 110 to as late as 150, at least).

I wonder whether the following pattern of growth of this tradition might not be discerned:

1. The authors ("we") of 1 John 1.1-3, presumably including the elder John, write as if they are eyewitnesses to something, but they do not say what. Let us imagine that it is simply whatever event founded the particular (branch of the) sect they lead.
2. Papias, according to Eusebius, used testimonies from 1 Peter and 1 John. Bauckham and others speculate that these testimonies had to do with eyewitness testimony, implying 1 Peter 5.1, 13 and 1 John 1.1-3. Papias, then, thinks of John the elder as being a witness to the life of the Lord in some capacity. (Note, however, that witnesses and disciples are not the same thing.)
3. Later on, this John had to be made a disciple; hence the interpolated phrase as described in the OP and, in various quarters, the equation of John the elder with John the son of Zebedee.

In step 1, there is no need to make John the elder in any way contemporaneous with Jesus.

In step 2, however, the need to make John's lifetime overlap with Jesus' becomes mandatory. There is an interesting tradition (mentioned by Eisler) that John the evangelist was a boy during Jesus' lifetime:

Pseudo-Hilary, Tractate on John 1a: 1a Iohannes sanctissimus evangelista inter omnes apostolos iunior fuit. hunc, cum disquirerent apostoli quisnam eorum maior esset, tenuit Dominus dicens: «Quicumque non fuerit conversus sicut puer hic,» et cetera. ipse est qui super pectus Domini recumbebat. ipse est quem prae ceteris diligebat Iesus, cui et Mariam matrem, et ipsum Mariae filium tradidit. / 1a John the most holy evangelist was the younger among all the apostles. When the apostles discussed which of them was greater, the Lord held him, saying: "Whoever is not converted as this child," and the rest. It is he himself who reclined upon the breast of the Lord. It is he himself whom Jesus esteemed more than the rest, to whom also he transmitted his mother Mary, and whom he transmitted as son to Mary.

Making John the lad on Jesus' lap and also an apostle seems rather incongruous. It is easier to date the core of this tradition internally to a stage of traditional development when John had to be a witness but did not have to be an apostle. Step 2 above is the perfect spot.

A parallel yet apparently independent way of making the elder John at least briefly contemporaneous with Jesus may be the Johannine maneuver followed up on by Irenaeus:

John 8.57: So the Jews said to Him, "You are not yet fifty years old, and have You seen Abraham?"

Irenaeus, Demonstration 74: 74 And again David says thus concerning the sufferings of Christ: "Why did the Gentiles rage, and the people imagine vain things? Kings rose up on the earth and princes were gathered together against the Lord and his Anointed." For Herod the king of the Jews and Pontius Pilate, the governor of Claudius Caesar, came together and condemned Him to be crucified.

Irenaeus, Against Heresies 2.22.6: 6 But, besides this, those very Jews who then disputed with the Lord Jesus Christ have most clearly indicated the same thing. For when the Lord said to them, "Your father Abraham rejoiced to see My day; and he saw it, and was glad," they answered Him, "Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast Thou seen Abraham? " Now, such language is fittingly applied to one who has already passed the age of forty, without having as yet reached his fiftieth year, yet is not far from this latter period. But to one who is only thirty years old it would unquestionably be said, "Thou art not yet forty years old." For those who wished to convict Him of falsehood would certainly not extend the number of His years far beyond the age which they saw He had attained; but they mentioned a period near His real age, whether they had truly ascertained this out of the entry in the public register, or simply made a conjecture from what they observed that He was above forty years old, and that He certainly was not one of only thirty years of age. For it is altogether unreasonable to suppose that they were mistaken by twenty years, when they wished to prove Him younger than the times of Abraham. For what they saw, that they also expressed; and He whom they beheld was not a mere phantasm, but an actual being of flesh and blood. He did not then want much of being fifty years old; and, in accordance with that fact, they said to Him, "Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast Thou seen Abraham?"

As Joe Wallack pointed out to me many moons ago, dating Jesus' crucifixion to his forties would move it up into the reign of Claudius, exactly as Irenaeus figures. Perhaps this move was made necessary by the growing notion that John the elder had seen the Lord during his lifetime; the years had to be crunched together somehow. If Bauckham and company are correct about Papias interpreting John 1.1-3 as indicating eyewitness testimony, then this process of redating may have begun already in Papias' day; if not, then it probably began later, but it happened nonetheless. If it began in Papias' day, then Papias probably did not know John the elder personally; rather, he simply assumed (based on 1 John 1.1-3) that John the elder had witnessed Jesus; he paired these verses with the similar ones regarding Peter in his Catholic epistle (1 Peter 5.1, 13); and he thus justified three separate strands of the tradition: two written (the gospel of Mark, based on the allegedly eyewitness testimony of Peter, and the gospel of Matthew, based on Matthew's own allegedly eyewitness testimony) and one oral (the traditions gleaned from John and Aristion, some of which eventually flowed into the fourth canonical gospel).

In step 3, the identification of John the elder with John of Zebedee, disciple and apostle, is complete. As time passed, the coordination of years became less and less important, since times tend to look and feel the same from a chronological distance, and both the dating of Jesus' death to Claudius' tenure and the making of the child on Jesus' lap out to be John fell by the wayside.