Jesus as a Witness in the Gospel of John

Zbigniew Grochowski

Abstract

Jesus is usually an object of someone’s testimony in the Gospel of St. John, but there are a few texts speaking of Jesus as the One who gives or bears His testimony to something. Accepting as a criterion the occurrences of the terms marture,w („to bear testimony”) and marturi,a („testimony”) – the noun ma,rtuj („witness”) does not occur in the Fourth Gospel – it is possible to distribute them into four categories: (1) Jesus “testifies about what he has seen and heard” (3:32-33), which means He reveals His Father to the world. (2) Jesus testifies about Himself (5:31.[36]; 8:13-14.17-18; [10,25]) – and He is supported in this by His Father – that He did nothing wrong healing a sick man at the Bethesda pool, even though it happened on the Sabbath (cf. 5:1-9); (3) Jesus “is testifying about the world that its deeds are evil” (7:7) seeing as – some Jews even wanted to kill Him (cf. 7:1.19.25.30.44); (4) Jesus testifies to the truth (18:37), which ultimately means the definitive revelation of God which Jesus brings to the world and with which He identifies Himself (cf. 14:6). Sentenced by Pilate, dying on the cross, Christ – in the most credible way – testified to love: This truth about God – obligating Jesus’ disciples to also assume this attitude in their lives (cf. 13:14.34-35) – can be expressed by a principle: “no one has greater love than this – that one lays down his life for his friends” (15:13).

Keywords:

Jesus’ testimony, witness, truth, revelation of God, love, world, Jews, Jesus’ brothers