More Secret Scriptures: John and the Young Bishop of Ephesus
In celebration of the release of my new book, Secret Scriptures Revealed: A New Introduction to the Christian Apocrypha, I am running a series of posts on texts that could not be included in the book due to space considerations (so many texts, so little room). The first of these is a story about the apostle John transmitted by Clement of Alexandria in his Quis dives salvetur (42.1-15). I only recently came across the story and I am surprised that it is not featured in the popular Christian Apocrypha collections, nor is it mentioned in the standard introductions to the Acts of John. The translation below is taken from an online edition of Eusebius's Ecclesiastical History 3.23, which excerpts the text from Clement's work (translated by Arthur Cushman McGiffert from Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series, Vol. 1).
1. At that time the apostle and evangelist John, the one whom Jesus loved, was still living in Asia, and governing the churches of that region, having returned after the death of Domitian from his exile on the island.
2. And that he was still alive at that time may be established by the testimony of two witnesses. They should be trustworthy who have maintained the orthodoxy of the Church; and such indeed were Irenaeus and Clement of Alexandria.
3. The former in the second book of his work Against Heresies, writes as follows: And all the elders that associated with John the disciple of the Lord in Asia