Literary Devices in Johannine Epsitles (1-3 John)
Symbolism, Imagery, Allegory
Setting
Jerusalem. Rome. Samaria. Corinth. Biblical settings can be rich, majestic, and beautiful and add layers of meaning and understanding to our knowledge of the ancient texts.John's Epistles don't hav...
Genre
John's Epistles are exactly what they say they are: epistles. That's just a fancy word meaning letters. So essentially, we're sorting through some of the elder's really old mail. Easy peasy lemon s...
What's Up With the Title?
The Epistles of John are called that because Christian tradition says they're written by—you guessed it—a guy named John. Of course, this isn't just any random 1st-century dude. This is the sam...
Trivia
The Third Epistle of John is the shortest book in the Bible at 294 words (in the King James Version). It's also the only book in the New Testament not to mention Jesus by name. Apparently the elder...
Sex, Drugs, and Violence Rating
The Epistles of John are pretty stinkin' tame. There's that one mention of "the desire of the flesh" (1 John 2:16). Even though that probably is code for sexy times, no one will be too scandalized....
Allusions
Doctor Faustus by Christopher MarloweDoctor Faustus reads aloud from his Bible, which quotes 1 John 1:8: "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and there is not truth in us." He...