John 21:24

τούτων … ταῦτα. It is more natural to understand ‘these things’ as referring to the whole Gospel and not to the appendix only. The Johannean phraseology is here of little weight as regards authorship: the Ephesian elders would naturally follow John 19:35. The change from present (μαρτυρῶν) to aorist (γράψας) indicates that the witness continues, the writing took place once for all. S. Chrysostom’s proposal to read οἶδα μέν for οἴδαμεν is quite inadmissible: but it does not follow from οἶδεν in John 19:35 that S. John would not write οἴδαμεν here. It would have been out of place in the middle of his narrative to add the testimony of the Ephesian elders to his own as to details which he saw with his own eyes at the foot of the cross. But it is not unnatural that at the close of his Gospel he should claim them as joint witnesses to the fidelity with which he has committed to writing this last instalment of evangelical and apostolic traditions. Comp. 1 John 5:18-20; 1 John 5:15; 1 John 3:14; 1 John 1:1; 3 John 1:12.