John the Elder

John the Presbyter was an obscure figure of the early Church who is either distinguished from or identified with the Apostle John, by some also John the Divine. He appears in fragments from the church father Papias of Hierapolis as one of the author's sources and is first unequivocally distinguished from the Apostle by Eusebius of Caesarea. He is frequently proposed as an alternative author of some of the Johannine books in the New Testament.

John the Presbyter appears in a fragment by Papias, a 2nd-century bishop of Hierapolis, who published an "Exposition of the Sayings of the Lord" (Greek κυριακῶν λογίων ἐξηγήσις — Kyriakôn logiôn exêgêsis) in five volumes. This work is lost but survives in fragments quoted by Irenaeus of Lyons (d. 202) and Eusebius of Caesarea (d. 339).

One of these fragments, quoted by Eusebius in his History of the Church (Book III, chapter 39), reads:

The interpretation of that text consists of two basic views: one view, first voiced by Eusebius of Caesarea, distinguishes between two Johns, the Apostle and the presbyter, while the other view, in line with most of Church tradition, identifies only one John.

The Church historian Eusebius of Caesarea, through whose quotation the above fragment survives, was the first to unequivocally distinguish a Presbyter John from the Apostle John. Accordingly, he introduced the quotation with the words:

After quoting Papias, Eusebius continues:

Eusebius identifies John the Presbyter as the author of the Book of Revelation, the canonical status of which he disputed as he disagreed with its content, especially the Chiliasm implied in the "millennial kingdom".

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