SECTION 1 - via - School of Visual Arts

has not been explicitly named by the artist? Two possible approaches can be distinguished: in
the first approach, the title of the work would be derived from the general cultural (in this case
biblical) understanding of the time when the work was created; or, one could appeal to the
earliest known titling of the work to appear in the history of the work. In our present case, such
an approach would argue that the Cleveland piece ought to remain named as it has been
traditionally titled: “Christ and St. John the Evangelist.”
On the other hand, if one assumes a stance toward interpretation that integrates the findings of
current (in this case, biblical) research as well as the contemporary valuing of the role of the
perceiver in the appreciation of a work of art, then one will argue for a change in the title of the
piece to: “Jesus and the Beloved Disciple.”
NOTES
1. Carolyn S. Jirousek, “Christ and St. John the Evangelist as a Model of Medieval
Mysticism,” Cleveland Studies in the History of Art 6(2001), 6-27.
2. See, for example, Dermot A. Lane, The Reality of Jesus. New York: Paulist Press, 1975,
pp. 153-162.
3. The Hebrew “messiah” is translated into Greek as “christos,” from which comes the
English “christ.” The term means “anointed one.”
4. Lane, 154.
5. Among others, Keith Nickle, The Synoptic Gospels, An Introduction. Atlanta: John Knox
Press, 1980. Nickle dates the composition of Mark in the late 60s and both Matthew and
Luke in the late 80s. Pheme Perkins, “The Gospel According to John,” in The New
Jerome Biblical Commentary 61:18, 949, dates the writing of John’s Gospel in the 90s.
6. Tatian the Syrian (fl. ca. 160-175) produced the Diatessaron (literally, “through the four”)
in which he blends the accounts of the four canonical gospels into one continuous
biographical narrative of the life of Jesus. See Joseph. F. Kelly, Why Is There a New
Testament? Wilmington: Michael Glazier, 1986, 86.
7. Jirousek, 16-18.
8. See Raymond E. Brown, The Gospel According to John, The Anchor Bible, Vols. 29 &
29A. New York: Doubleday, 1966; The Community of the Beloved Disciple. New York:
Paulist, 1979; The Gospel and Epistles of John. Collegeville: The Liturgical Press, 1988;
An Introduction to the New Testament. The Anchor Bible Reference Library. New York:
Doubleday, 1997.
9. Brown, The Gospel According to John I-XII, Vol. 29, xcviii.
10. Brown, The Community of the Beloved Disciple, 33-34.
11. None of the other three canonical gospels makes any reference to a “disciple whom Jesus
loved.” This is peculiar to John’s Gospel.
12. See Brown, The Community of the Beloved Disciple, 81-91.
13. The English “apostle” derives from the Greek “apostellos,” literally “one who is sent,”
while the English “disciple” comes from the Greek “mathetes” and means “one who
follows.”
14. “Episcopoi” in Greek is rendered literally as “overseers.”
15. Brown, The Gospel and Epistles of John, 73.
16. Brown, The Gospel According to John, Vol. 29, cxxxviii-cxliv; and, Vol. 29A, 545-547.
17. For the argument that the “other disciple” of John 18:15-16 ought to be identified as the
Beloved Disciple, see F. Neirynck, ETL 51 (1975) 115-51.
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