Feast of Saint John, Apostle and Evangelist, Joh 20,1-8

Let us look at least a little into the tradition and what ancient testimonies tell us about St. John. St. John the Evangelist was the son of Father Zebedee and mother Salome and the brother of St. James the Elder, the apostle. Together with the apostles Peter and James, they formed a kind of most intimate community around the Lord Jesus. They were witnesses of the Transfiguration on the mountain, but they also saw the bloody sweat in Gethsemane. The Lord Jesus gave them the nickname “sons of thunder.” The old tradition preserved in the letter of Polycarp of Ephesus to Pope Victor (189-198) speaks of St. John the Evangelist. Still, it also applies to his brother James, “John, who rested on the Lord’s chest, was by birth a priest and wore a petalon. He was a witness and a teacher. He rests in Ephesus”. According to this testimony, both brothers, James and John, came from the High Priestly family. The petal was the headdress of the high priests. Only the high priests had the right to wear the petal. 

Among the Jews, every priest who was not currently in the office of high priest had to earn his living by craft. We see this, for example, in St. Paul, who, in addition to studying at the feet of Gamaliel, nevertheless appears to master the making of tents. Perhaps from these facts, we can better understand the special request of their mother that they occupy more prominent places in the kingdom of God. In a certain sense, this request had its justification. Finally, with Peter the Apostle, who represents the New Testament priesthood, they form a unique, most confidential group around the Lord Jesus. It was known that the Jewish high priest was obliged to watch in prayer in the company of the younger priests the night before the Feast of Atonement. The Lord Jesus does the same on the Mount of Olives. From what we have said, we can understand both the truly theological talent that is manifested in the Gospel of St. John and the unique position that the Apostle James had among Christians of Jewish origin, as well as why St. James the Elder had to be the first of the apostles to die a martyr’s death.

The feast of St. John has been celebrated in the East since the 4th century. It was initially associated with the memory of his brother, James the Elder. According to tradition, St. John worked in Ephesus, was exiled to the island of Patmos under Emperor Domitian, where he wrote the Apocalypse, and after returning to Ephesus, where he wrote his Gospel, died at an advanced age (under Emperor Trajan). A legend also contributed to his veneration in the Middle Ages, according to which, to convert a certain pagan priest in Ephesus, he drank poisoned wine, and nothing happened to him. Another legend says that he was thrown into a vat of boiling oil before the Latin Gate in Rome without being harmed. On this saint’s feast day, wine is blessed in many places. This blessing, influenced by the aforementioned legend, developed from an ancient custom rooted in the ancient Greeks and Romans.

The liturgy of this feast presents St. John as the great herald of the mystery of the eternal and incarnate Word. In the first reading, we hear: “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our own eyes, which we have looked upon and our hands have handled, this we proclaim: the Word of life. For the life was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and was manifested to us” (Jn 1:12). In the prayer of the day, we again ask that we may understand the mystery of the eternal Word, which God revealed to us through St. John, with an enlightened mind and a loving heart. St. John was captivated by the Word, who became flesh and could be looked at with human eyes and touched with human hands. Let us ask through this apostle for respect for the human body, which became the dwelling place of the Word.