John the Presbyter

John the Presbyter appears in a fragment by Papias, a 2nd-century bishop of Hierapolis, who published an "Exposition of the Sayings of the Lord" (Greek κυριακῶν λογίων ἐξηγήσις — Kyriakôn logiôn exêgêsis) in five volumes. This work is lost but survives in fragments quoted by Irenaeus of Lyons (d. 202) and Eusebius of Caesarea (d. 339).

One of these fragments, quoted by Eusebius in his History of the Church (Book III, chapter 39), reads:

The interpretation of that text consists of two basic views: one view, first voiced by Eusebius of Caesarea, distinguishes between two Johns, the Apostle and the presbyter, while the other view, in line with most of Church tradition, identifies only one John.

Distinction

The Church historian Eusebius of Caesarea, through whose quotation the above fragment survives, was the first to unequivocally distinguish a Presbyter John from the Apostle John. Accordingly, he introduced the quotation with the words:

After quoting Papias, Eusebius continues:

Eusebius identifies John the Presbyter as the author of the Book of Revelation, the canonical status of which he disputed as he disagreed with its content, especially the Chiliasm implied in the "millennial kingdom".

The view of Eusebius was taken up by the Church Father Jerome in De Viris Illustribus (On Illustrious Men). In Chapter 9, which deals with the Apostle John and his writings, he ascribes to him both the Gospel and the First Epistle, and continues to say:

In Chapter 18, discussing Papias, Jerome repeats the fragment quoted above and continues:

Jerome's attribution of the Second and Third Epistle of John echoes the text of these books, in which the writer refers to himself ho presbyteros, which can be translated as "the presbyter, "the elder", "the ancient", "the old", the same word used by Papias.

The Decretum Gelasianum associated with Pope Gelasius I, though of later date, follows Jerome in accepting one letter of "John the apostle" and two letters of the "other John the elder".

In modern times, the distinction was frequently revived, mainly – and quite in contrast to Eusebius' views – "to support the denial of the Apostolic origin of the Fourth Gospel", whose "beauty and richness" some scholars had difficulty in ascribing to a "fisherman from Gallilee".

Identification controversy

Much of Church tradition squarely attributed all the Johannine books of the New Testament to a single author, the Apostle John. The view expounded by Eusebius has not remained uncontested. The Catholic Encyclopedia of the early 1900s, for instance, stated that the distinction "has no historical basis". To support this view, it related four main arguments:

• The testimony of Eusebius is disputed, as his statement that Papias "was not himself a hearer and eye-witness of the holy apostles" is contradicted by a passage in Eusebius' Chronicle which expressly calls the Apostle John the teacher of Papias.
• Eusebius' interpretation might derive from his opposition to Chiliasm and the Book of Revelation. Distinguishing between two persons called John, Eusebius could downgrade that book as the work of the Presbyter instead of the Apostle and also undermine Papias' reputation as a pupil of an Apostle.
• In the fragment, Papias uses the same words - presbyter (or elder) and disciples of the Lord – both in reference to the Apostles and to the second John. The double occurrence of John is explained by Papias' "peculiar relationship" to John, from which he had learned some things indirectly and others directly.
• Before Eusebius there exists no statement about a second John in Asia. Especially noteworthy in this context is Irenaeus of Lyons, himself a pupil of Polycarp of Smyrna. In his book Adversus Haereses, which survives in a Latin version, Irenaeus mentions "Papias, the hearer of John, and a companion of Polycarp" (Book V, chapter 33), without indicating that this was another John than "John, the disciple of the Lord, who also had leaned upon His breast [and] did himself publish a Gospel during his residence at Ephesus in Asia" (Book III, chapter 1).

In his "Letter to Florinus", which survives as a fragment, Irenaeus speaks of "Polycarp having thus received [information] from the eye-witnesses of the Word of life" including John, and as a "blessed and apostolical presbyter". Eusebius records that Irenaeus seems to canonize the gospel, the apocalypse, and at least one epistle as the writings of the same John.