 |
| William Temple, Archbishop of Canterbury (1942-44) |
 |
| John the Evangelist (painting by Titian, 1547) |
The title of this should be: "Looking ahead in a busy week (!) to the First Sunday after Christmas." I am relying on William Temple to share something with you about the prologue to John's Gospel this morning. I will preach on it twice this upcoming weekend - once on Christmas morning and once on Sunday morning. It is such a rich and deep passage that I am a bit overwhelmed when it comes to blogging about it. I hope this excerpt from Temple's commentary on the Gospel of John will be helpful for you. It takes two verses and makes one good, solid point about them that funds a great deal of reflection. When I read these verses, and when I read Temple's comments on them, I come away with the sense that Christ is meaning. Christ is the source of all meaning and meaning exists before time. Meaning is redemptive.
From Readings in St. John’s Gospel by William Temple (Morehouse Barlow, 1985):
John 1:1-2: In the beginning was the Word. And the Word was with God. And the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God.
I have no doubt that in a general sense St. John is here following the thought of Philo; but this does not mean that he was a student of Philo’s writings. The term ‘Logos’ was in general use in the Hellenistic world … The Evangelist is not here proclaiming unfamiliar truth; rather he is seeking common ground with his readers … He finds it in this word ‘Logos’, which alike for Jew and Gentile represents the ruling fact of the universe, and represents that fact as the self-expression of God. The Jew will remember that ‘by the Word of the Lord were the heavens made’; the Greek will think of the rational principle of which all natural laws are particular expressions. Both will agree that this Logos is the starting point of all things. It exists as it always did εν άρχή – in the beginning, at the root of the universe. (4-5)
Notes (from Danielle):
Philo of Alexandria was a first century philosopher who married Greek and Jewish thought.
Logos is a Greek word that means “word.” In ancient Greek philosophy, it is the idea of a rational, ordering principle in the universe.
“Hellenistic” refers to Greek culture ca 4th – 2nd century BCE.
εν άρχή means “in the beginning.” These are the first two words of John’s Gospel in Koine Greek: εν άρχή ήν ο λογος (“in the beginning was the word”).
