Talk:First Epistle of John

"Tertullian quoted... St. Cyprius quoted..." needs citing
''Tertullian quoted these verses in 200 AD. St Cyprian quoted these verses around the year 250. '' This is contentious compared to the previous statement that documents appeared after 800 AD. If Tertullian and St Cyprius did quote the Comma Johanneum in 200 AD (and 250 AD), it would necessarily "appear" before 800 AD. First appear vs. appear in the extant copies.

It also needs quoting, because Tertullian developed the Trinity doctrine and formula. Tertullian could have been the source quoted in the epistle by a scribe in the margins, and the comment was subsequently absorbed into the epistle. (See List of Bible verses not included in modern translations)

--Phrenomics (talk) 09:54, 6 March 2009 (UTC)

Neilinoz
The reason why I changed the section on authorship was that the previous version seemed to indicate that the Apostle John was only the traditional author, while at the same time seeming to show that a single authorship was only a 50/50 chance.

While it cannot be proved beyond reasonable doubt that the author was actually the Apostle John, the language, concepts and content in this epistle is very similar to both 2 John, 3 John and the Gospel of John. I simply added what the possibilities could be - John himself, one person acting as John, or a group of people acting together. Neilinoz

Modern scholars
The statement "Modern scholars believe" that the Apostle John is not among the list of possible authors seems too definitive. I simply added "many" to clarify. Ericscot 20:14, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Link
I removed a link to an article called "Did John’s Epistles Identify Paul As A False Prophet?", from http://www.jesuswordsonly.com/Free/ch13.pdf. I found the article to be full of original research and inaccuracies; perhaps someone else can verify whether it should really be there. / Fred-J 09:52, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

Comma Johanneum
This section needs to be edited in line with the more accurate and balanced main article Comma Johanneum, leaving out or explaining the misleading "controversial" in the sentence "Among the most controversial verses of the Bible is an explicit reference to what some people consider the trinity". Nor is it the Trinity that "some people consider" in this case but the application of the reference that "some people consider". --Wetman (talk) 00:03, 1 January 2010 (UTC)

If the verse is spurious, its reasonable to conclude the doctrine behind it is as well. - Judaizer

Written to Gentiles?
This article speculates that John's epistles were written to Gentiles! Hardly. The Bible states that the 12 Apostles never ministered to Gentiles (Matt 10:5-6) - not even years after the Ascension, after the conversion of Cornelius (Acts 11:19). The only Apostle who ever ministered to Gentiles was Paul, the rest did not (Gal 2:9).

This is confirmed by the fact that Peter and James' epistles were explicitly written to Jews (James 1:1, 1 Pet 1:1, 2 Pet 3:1), while John's epistles speak of Gentiles in the third person (3 John 7), draw a contrast between the readers and "the whole world" (1 John 2:2), and speak of "GOING OUT into the world" (1 John 4:1, 2 John 7).

So there is no reason whatsoever to presume that John's epistles have anything at all to do with Gentiles.

I would have corrected the article myself, however, I'm getting used to how Wikipedia works now: Whenever I correct an obvious, glaring error in a Christian article, it invariably gets changed back, and I'm held in contempt! So I'll let other people worry about editing the article, I'm just pointing out the facts here! Grand Dizzy (talk) 22:50, 30 December 2017 (UTC)
 * The article references this claim to a book by Ernest DeWitt Burton. I've added personal attribution since it seems semi-speculative. This is not a claim which is obviously in error. The historical accuracy of the New Testament is disputed; see Historical reliability of the Gospels and Historical reliability of the Acts of the Apostles.  It is also disputed whether John the Apostle is actually the author of this epistle and is the same person as John the Evangelist; see John the Evangelist. If there are notable biblical scholars who hold the opposite view to Burton, they should be added to the article, with citations. -- Beland (talk) 00:04, 28 March 2020 (UTC)

Self-published author adding himself
An author who has written a self-published book just admitted that he himself is the author and he reverts to insert himself. The book clearly does not meet our standards for reliable sources in an academic article, as it is a self-published work with no peer-review. I will leave it for now, but if no strong arguments are given for what like very much like self-promotion, it will be removed from the article. Jeppiz (talk) 12:14, 31 January 2018 (UTC)


 * As no counterarguments have been been presented, I will proceed to remove the self-published book as it does not meet our requirements for academic works. Wikipedia is not the place for self-promotion, especially not when done in the 'drive-through' way and (it would seem) by using multiple accounts for the same purpose. Jeppiz (talk) 13:20, 2 February 2018 (UTC)

The Mountain Goats
Really? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.216.2.184 (talk) 19:35, 1 April 2023 (UTC)