2 John

Composition

The Second Letter of John (“2 John”), also known as the Second Epistle of John, is the middle entry in a series of three letters historically attributed to John, the apostle of Jesus Christ. Together, the three letters are known as the Johannine letters, Letters of John, or Epistles of John. The Johannine letters sparked one of the most intense authorship controversies in the entire Christian canon, which has been ongoing since the early stages of the religion’s history and is not likely ever to be fully resolved.

Ecclesiastical officials completed the task of formalizing the canonical works of the New Testament in the fourth century CE. As part of this arduous process, early Christian scholars considered many pieces of literature for possible elevation to the level of official scripture. Before the New Testament’s standardization was complete, certain writings were accepted by some Christian communities and not others. The Second Letter of John represents one such work. It was among the last pieces of biblical literature to be approved for inclusion in the New Testament.

During their review of 2 John, early Christian scholars determined that John the apostle was its author. Their basis for doing so was largely the product of testimony preserved in the work of the Christian historian Eusebius, who referenced two contemporaries of John named Polycarp and Papias. John’s accepted authorship of the letters and gospel that bear his name is based primarily on the testimony of Polycarp and Papias, who named John as their author. In the case of the Johannine letters, 1 John offers almost no information about its author at all apart from references in the opening verses that imply its composer was a firsthand witness of the ministry of Jesus Christ. In the case of 2 John and its companion epistle, the Third Letter of John (“3 John”), the text self-references its author as “the elder.” Whether this “elder” was the apostle John or another individual who happened to share John’s name is not known.

The Johannine letters are traditionally dated to about 60 CE to 100 CE, with scholars generally placing their composition toward the latter end of that date range. If John the apostle was the author of the gospel and letters credited to him, then he would have been an elderly man nearing the end of his life at that time. Other commentators have advanced an alternative theory suggesting the “elder” was a scribe or official representative of high standing within the Christian church who was personally known to John or other disciples of Christ.

Thematic elements and stylistic features of the Johannine letters lead most researchers to believe that all three epistles were the work of the same author. Experts and Christian officials also believe that both the Gospel of John and the Johannine letters were created at relatively late stages compared to the other canonical writings of the New Testament. As a matter of tradition, Christians generally accept that John was the last of Christ’s original disciples to die. However, this supporting evidence proved insufficient to quell the authorship controversy over the Johannine letters, which began during the standardization of the Christian canon and has continued ever since.

Summary

The Second Letter of John is one of the shortest books in the Christian Bible. It is comprised of a single chapter spanning only thirteen verses. The King James version of the Bible renders 2 John in just 298 words, while other translations of the Bible reduce it to fewer than 250 words. In the New Testament, only the Third Letter of John is a shorter biblical book as measured by the number of words.

To fully understand the contents of 2 John, readers need background knowledge on the historical context in which it was written. During the tenuous first decades of Christianity, the religion was structured across a loose, decentralized network of sects. Not all sects adhered to the same religious teachings. While an orthodoxic version of Christianity evolved around fundamentalist and literal interpretations of the words and teachings of Jesus Christ, breakaway Christian sects adopted different beliefs.

In some cases, beliefs deemed heretical by firsthand witnesses of Christ’s ministry—such as John the apostle, or whoever wrote the Johannine letters—flourished among some groups who self-identified as Christians. Such heresies were concocted and spread by false prophets, some of whom claimed to have had deep and revealing mystical experiences that revealed principles contradictory to those endorsed by Christ. For example, some Christian sects came to reject the fundamental doctrine of Christianity, which holds that Jesus Christ was the physical incarnation and embodiment of God. Other sects and their false-prophet leaders claimed to possess Christ-like characteristics, claiming themselves to be God incarnate, morally pure, and born without the original sin inherited by all of humankind from the biblical Adam after he was expelled by God from the Garden of Eden.

The Johannine letters are all responses to the heretical conflicts that destabilized Christianity during its tenuous early history to endanger the inchoate faith’s growth and survival. In 2 John, the author encourages the congregation of a legitimate and faithful church—colorfully referred to as “the elect lady and her children” (2 John 1:1)—to spurn the heretical congregations denying the essentialist doctrine of the physical incarnation of God in Jesus Christ.

Commentators interpret the call as specifically targeting a set of heretical beliefs known as Docetism, which holds that Christ did not have a normal corporeal body and was instead embodied in a phantastic corpus made of an ethereal, heavenly substance. The text of 2 John states, “Whoever transgresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God. He that abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son. If there any come unto you and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him God speed: For he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evil deeds” (2 John 1:9–11). Thus, the letter also rejects the forcible excision and estrangement of the docetic heretics from the Christian faith, instead endorsing their inclusion in the community through their acceptance of true dogmas and doctrines.

Themes

The Second Letter of John continues many of the themes established in its preceding work, the First Letter of John. Notably, the Johannine epistles also display significant thematic and doctrinal similarities with the Gospel of John, which has historically served to strengthen claims to all four works sharing common authorship.

Two important themes permeate 2 John: truth and love. The letter immediately establishes the truth theme: “The elder unto the elect lady and her children, whom I love in the truth; and not I only, but also all they that have known the truth; For the truth’s sake, which dwelleth within us, and shall be with us for ever” (2 John 1:1–2). The concept of “truth” was a major battleground for competing sects within early Christianity, as doctrinal and dogmatic disagreements posed a major threat to the religion’s survival. To orthodox Christians, the byproducts of doctrinal conflicts posed another deeply troubling problem as they broadened Christianity’s appeal to idol worshippers, drawing it into a sphere of pagan influence that was (and still is) considered blasphemous. By positioning the Christian orthodoxy developed from the direct teachings of Jesus Christ as truth, the author of 2 John frames his entreaty as a means for wayward Christian communities to achieve validation.

The theme of love also carries over from 1 John, in which the author urges the Christian faithful holding orthodox beliefs to reject the heretics within their ranks but also to love them. The Second Letter of John concludes with similar sentiments. The epistle instructs readers not to accept heretical and blasphemous doctrines in their houses of worship, but also not to cast heretics away. The warning “[f]or he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evil deeds” (2 John 1:11) notes Christians’ personal responsibility to conduct themselves in the image of Christ and act as Christ would have acted in the same situation.

In a broader and more general sense, 2 John and the other Johannine letters reveal the critical role doctrinal standardization played in the growth of Christianity. At this early juncture of Christian history, the lack of a universally agreed-upon scriptural canon had exposed itself as a major liability. However, as ecclesiastical officials worked to create a canonical set of New Testament works, Christianity stabilized and began to draw adherents in large numbers. Most experts and historians believe that the two trends share causal links. In 313 CE, the Christian faith was legalized in the Roman Empire and went on to become Rome’s official religion within a decade.

Bibliography

“2 John.” United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, 2022, bible.usccb.org/bible/2john/1. Accessed 27 Apr. 2022.

Olsson, Birger. A Commentary on the Letters of John: An Intra-Jewish Approach. Wipf and Stock Publishers, 2013.

Lockett, Darian. The Catholic Epistles: Critical Readings. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2021, pp. 175–205.

Swindoll, Chuck. “Second John.” Insight for Living Ministries, 2022, insight.org/resources/bible/the-general-epistles/second-john. Accessed 27 Apr. 2022.

Van Der Watt, Jan. An Introduction to the Johannine Gospel and Letters. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2008.

“Who Wrote 1, 2, & 3 John?” Zondervan Academic, 3 Oct. 2019, zondervanacademic.com/blog/who-wrote-1-2-3-john. Accessed 27 Apr. 2022.