TLES OF.
Authenticity. Eusebius places the second and third epistles of John among the an-tee-leh-g-om eh'na, disputed books (Hist. Eccics, iii:25).
The second epistle is addressed to a lady, called Supla, koo-ree'ah, Kuria, Lady, which name fre quently occurs in ancient writers as that of a woman (comp. Liicke's Commentar, p. 351).
The third epistle is addressed to Gaius, a person otherwise unknown. It is remarkable that the writer of this epistle calls himself O rpecrperrepor, ho-fires-bu'ter-os, the elder, or presbyter. Some writers have been inclined to ascribe these letters to the presbyter John, who is sometimes spoken of in the ancient church, and to whom even the Apocalypse has been attributed; but if the pres byter John wrote these epistles, John's Gospel also must be ascribed to the same person, of whom otherwise so little is known. This, however, is inadmissible. We inay suppose that the term, rpecrPrepos, elder, expressed in the epistles of John a degree of friendliness, and was chosen on account of the advanced age of the writer. The apostle Paul, also, in his friendly letters to Phile mon, abstains from the title Apostle. The cir
cumstances and events in the church, to which the second epistle alludes, coincide with those which are otherwise known to have happened in John's congregation. Here, also, are allusions to the dangers arising from the Gnostic heresy. The admonition, in verse to, not to receive such here tics as Christian brethren, agrees with the an cient tradition, that John made haste to quit a public bath after Cerinthus the Gnostic entered it, declaring he was afraid the building would fall down.
Rickli's Johannis erster Brief erklort und an gewendet mit historischem Vorbericht und erktir enden Atimerkungen (Lucerne, 1828) ; Liicke's Auslegung (2d ed. 1836). Dr. Shepherd's Notes on the Gospels and Epistles of St. John, 4to, 1796; and the only separate work on the Epistles is Hawkins' Commentary on the Epistles of St. John, 1808. A translation of Liicke's Commen tary on the Epistles of SI. John exists in the Xiib heal Cabinet, vol. xv. Saml. Cox, The Private Letters of St. Paul and John, Lond., 1867. (See also literature cited under Jontst, THE FIRST