Journal: Priscilla Papers
Volume: PP 28:3 (Summer 2014)
Article: Editor’s Reflections
Author: William David Spencer

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PP 28:3 (Summer 2014) p. 2

Editor’s Reflections

William David Spencer

During daily devotions, even the most harried or casual reader arriving at the second and third epistles of John (2 John and 3 John) is struck by the similarities of structure and style. In 1912, Canon A. E. Brooke, in his International Critical Commentary volume, showed us exactly what we are noticing by listing all the parallel Greek phrases in these letters, demonstrating “the following phrases show the close similarity of their general structure.”1 For him, since “it is hardly necessary to discuss the question of their common authorship, . . . the Second and Third Epistles of S. John naturally form a pair.”2 What is true of one is true of the other.

Third John, we notice, is written to “the beloved Gaius, whom I love in truth.” Second John is written to “The Elect Lady (kuria) and her children, whom I love in truth, and not I only but also all those having known the truth.”3 Can this mean that a woman was presiding over a church in the lifetime of Jesus’s disciple John? Clement of Alexandria thought “Electa” was the proper name of the recipient, while J. Rendel Harris collated information from ancient personal letters in the Oxyrhynchus and Fayum Papyri to argue “Kuria” was actually the recipient’s name.4 Others speculate, in the words of the great exegete Theodor Zahn, “2 John is really directed to a local Church which the author addresses as a chosen mistress, as the mother of its members, wedded to the Lord Christ.”5 Canon Brooke, who does not appear to fathom the idea that a woman can be presiding over a church, agrees, “The general character of the Epistle is almost decisive against the view that it is addressed to an individual.” Why is that? Because, “the subjects with which it deals are such as affect a community rather than an individual or a family, though much of its contents might be regarded as advice needed by the leading member of a Church on whom the duty mainly fell of entertaining the strangers who visited it.” Another reason he proffers is, “The substance of what is said in vv. 6, 8, 10, 12 is clearly not addressed to children. The ‘children’ of the ‘Elect Lady’ must certainly have reached the age of manhood.”6 Now, that really is a curious set of objections and tells us something abou...

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