Jesus and After | From Readers #1

THE LOVE COMMANDMENT

Reader: I wonder if you have ever addressed the difference between the "Golden Rule" and the "New Commandment" in John 13:34? I have just started reading "Jesus and After" where I saw your discussion of the Golden Rule. It seems to me the new commandment is somewhat of a departure from the Golden Rule. In my experience, Christian churches rarely address it. In any case, I find what I've read so far absolutely fascinating. Thank you for such an interesting book.

Author: Good question. No, I don't take up John 13:34 later in the book. You are quite right that it is an important passage, and ideally should be included. But it would have been complicated to do so. For instance:

If you look at Jn 13:33-36, you will see that v34-35 are intrusive: they can be taken out, and not only is no harm done to the rest of the text, but much more important, v36 is now a direct response to v33. That was probably the original state of things, and v34-35 are a later addition. This is how we detect interpolations.

When might that interpolation have been made? The idea appears again in John 15:12. Now we are in interesting territory, because it is widely recognized (and I think those people are right) that John 15-17 are themselves an intrusion into John as it previously was. It then becomes possible that when John 15 was added, someone thought to anchor that new thought in the older John material as well.

I didn't go into that in the book, partly because it takes a lot of explaining, and the idea was to give only a sketch of the evolution of the early Jesus movement, not to do a complete history. I figured it was better to do some key things simply, enough to show the general direction of things, rather than to give it all. But of course these decisions can be endlessly argued, and it may be that I was wrong on that one.

The love commandment of John 15 (and maybe 13) is not the same as the Golden Rule. The Golden Rule is universal: it tells how you treat everybody. The Love Commandment, as John makes clear, applies only to the believer community, not to the outside world. It is in fact going to be the distinguishing point for the Christian communities, as against everyone else. "By this they shall know."

When did that distinctiveness begin to set in? I would say, around the time of the Pastoral Epistles (which I date before John), when local communities gained more self-government, and thus also greater difference from the general population. This was the Age of Nero, and the beginning of serious persecutions of Christians as such. In those conditions, little groups tend to band together more closely. Of course the great divide was the later persecution resulting from the Birkat ha-Minim, a Rabbinic addition to the daily synagogue prayers, which resulted in the expulsion of Jesus followers from Jewish synagogues. That IS in the book, and you will come to it in good time..

Anyway, I am glad you found the book interesting, and I appreciate your taking the time to write in.

The Author

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