Don't Know Much About the Bible - Kenneth C. Davis [183]
• 1 John
The first of three letters opens in a style very reminiscent of the poetic opening of the Gospel of John:
Something which has existed
since the beginning,
which we have heard,
which we have seen with our own eyes,
which we have watched
and touched with our own hands,
the Word of life,
this is our theme. (1 John 1:1 NJB)
The author then goes on to denounce those who deny that Jesus appeared in the flesh after the resurrection. The teaching of these “antichrists” may have been an early form of Gnosticism, the religious philosophy that so disrupted the unity of the early churches, and was eventually treated as heresy.
• 2 John
Trivia fans may want to note: this is the shortest book of the Bible. Consisting of only thirteen verses, the book is by an author who calls himself “the elder.” He repeats the warning that believers must not be deceived by those who say that Jesus never returned in the flesh but only in spirit form. It is addressed to the “elect lady and her children,” but that is a figure of speech for a church, possibly in Asia Minor.
• 3 John
Another brief letter, this is addressed to an individual named Gaius, an exemplary member of an unnamed church. The author again calls himself “the elder,” and complains that the leader of Gaius’s church lacks humility, does not show proper hospitality to guests, and is spreading false accusations.
Beloved, let us love one another, because love is from God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God for God is love. (1 John 4:7-8)
Many deceivers have gone out into the world, those who do not confess that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh; any such person is the deceiver and the anti-Christ! (2 John 7)
Beloved, do not imitate what is evil but imitate what is good. Whoever does good is from God; whoever does evil has not seen God. (3 John 11)
• Jude
Only twenty-five verses long, Jude is written by someone calling himself a “servant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James.” For this reason, the letter was attributed to another of Jesus’ actual brothers, of which there were said to be four: James, Joseph, Simon, and Judas. The name was shortened to Jude because nobody wanted a letter from somebody named “Judas” in the Bible. This was a tract devoted to combating the “false teachings,” again identified with early Gnostics, that had spread throughout the early Christian community.
But you, beloved, must remember the predictions of the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ; for they said to you, “In the last time there will be scoffers, indulging in their own ungodly lusts.” It is these worldly people, devoid of the Spirit, who are causing divisions. (Jude 17-19)
Apocalypse Now
REVELATION
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.
And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. (Rev. 21:1-2)
* Why is 666 the Number of the Beast?
The author of the New Testament’s last book starts off simply enough in the form of a letter to seven churches in Asia Minor. Harshly condemning the sins of the world, he then takes his readers into a nightmarish, kaleidoscopic vision completely removed from the works of Paul or anyone else in the New Testament. Wild images dance across the pages, leaving centuries of befuddled readers and generations of eager “End Is Near” doomsayers in his wake. Strange visions. Earthquakes. Mysterious numerology. Trumpets. Angels. Horse. Blood and Plagues. Death, Doom, and Destruction.
Welcome to the Gospel According to Fellini or Salvador Dalí.
The author calls himself John but he is clearly not the John of