D. Moody Smith

The Testimony of the Beloved Disciple

Biblical Studies & Commentaries

“The Testimony of the Beloved Disciple is more than a collection of Richard Bauckham's essays on the Fourth Gospel. Taken as a whole, it is a programmatic statement of the author's thesis and argument, the crux of which is embodied in the title. If one infers that Bauckham believes the Johannine community of scholarship has largely gone off the rails, that would not be wrong. He proposes to set it right by paying close attention to the Gospel's own data and claims and by canvassing and assessing the considerable body of evidence bearing on this Gospel in patristic sources. This has not been done in a long time, and perhaps never as thoroughly and with such penetrating critical insight. That Bauckham has a thesis to set out and defend makes his book all the more interesting and important.”