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1993-03-13
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SECOND JOHN
ABOUT A.D. 85 TO 90
BY WAY OF INTRODUCTION
There is little to add to what was said about the First
Epistle except that here the author terms himself "the elder"
(\ho presbuteros\) and writes to "the elect lady" (\eklektêi
kuriâi\). There is dispute about both of these titles. Some hold
that it is the mythical "presbyter John" of whom Papias may
speak, if so understood, but whose very existence is disproved by
Dom Chapman in _John the Presbyter and the Fourth Gospel_ (1911).
Peter the apostle (#1Pe 1:1|) calls himself "fellow-elder"
(\sunpresbuteros\) with the other elders (#1Pe 5:1|). The word
referred originally to age (#Lu 15:25|), then to rank or office
as in the Sanhedrin (#Mt 16:21; Ac 6:12|) and in the Christian
churches (#Ac 11:30; 20:17; 1Ti 5:17,19|) as here also. A few
even deny that the author is the same as in the First Epistle of
John, but just an imitator. But the bulk of modern scholarly
opinion agrees that the same man wrote all three Epistles and the
Fourth Gospel (the Beloved Disciple, and many still say the
Apostle John) whatever is true of the Apocalypse. There is no way
of deciding whether "the elect lady" is a woman or a church. The
obvious way of taking it is to a woman of distinction in one of
the churches, as is true of "the co-elect lady in Babylon" (#1Pe
5:13|), Peter's wife, who travelled with him (#1Co 9:5|). Some
even take \kuria\ to be the name of the lady (Cyria). Some also
take it to be "Eklecta the lady." Dr. Findlay (_Fellowship in the
Life Eternal_, p. 31) holds that Pergamum is the church to which
the letter was sent. The same commentaries treat I, II, and III
John as a rule, though Poggel has a book on II, III John (1896)
and Bresky (1906) has _Das Verhaltnis des Zweiten Johannesbriefes
zum dritten_. Dr. J. Rendel Harris has an interesting article in
_The Expositor_ of London for March, 1901, on "The Problem of the
Address to the Second Epistle of John," in which he argues from
papyri examples that \kuria\ here means "my dear" or "my lady."
But Findlay (_Fellowship in the Life Eternal_, p. 26) argues that
"the qualifying adjunct 'elect' lifts us into the region of
Christian calling and dignity." It is not certain that II John
was written after I John, though probable. Origen rejected it and
the Peshitta Syriac does not have II and III John.