99 Fun Facts About Gospel of John

Which term from Greek philosophy does John's prologue apply to Christ, rendered 'the Word' in English Bibles?

Logos: in Goethe's Faust, the scholar struggling to translate this verse rejects 'Word' and finally writes 'In the beginning was the Deed'.

Which word completes John 1:14 in the NIV: 'The Word became ___ and made his dwelling among us'?

Flesh: when this passage closed the old Latin Mass as the Last Gospel, the priest genuflected at the words 'Et Verbum caro factum est'.

Which title did John the Baptist give Jesus at the Jordan, adding 'who takes away the sin of the world'?

The Lamb of God was said the day after priests and Levites had questioned the Baptist, and its Latin form, Agnus Dei, became a fixed part of the Catholic Mass.

In which Galilean village did Jesus perform his first sign, at a wedding where the wine ran out?

Cana is where the master of the banquet, tasting the new wine without knowing where it came from, told the bridegroom he had saved the best till now.

Which verse, the shortest in the King James Bible, comes as Christ nears a dead friend's tomb in John 11?

Jesus wept is John 11:35, and the onlookers read the tears two ways: 'See how he loved him!' and why had a healer of the blind not prevented the death.

What three things does Jesus call himself in John 14:6?

The way, truth and life was Jesus's answer to a disciple who had just said, 'Lord, we don't know where you are going, so how can we know the way?'

Which title does Jesus take in John 10, contrasting himself with a hired hand who runs from the wolf?

The good shepherd calls his own sheep by name, and Jesus adds that he has 'other sheep that are not of this sheep pen' still to bring in.

Which apostle, absent when the risen Jesus first appeared to the disciples, said he must touch the nail marks to believe?

Thomas, also called Didymus, cried 'My Lord and my God!' a week later, and Jesus replied that those who believe without seeing are blessed.

Jesus told the woman at Jacob's well she had had five husbands; which region was she from?

Samaria: leaving her water jar, she told her town about him, and many Samaritans there believed because of her testimony.

What did Jesus do for his disciples at the supper in John 13 that Peter at first refused?

Washed their feet: told 'Unless I wash you, you have no part with me', Peter asked Jesus to wash his hands and head as well.

Which friend of Jesus, dead four days and smelling in the tomb, did he call out alive in John 11?

Lazarus came out still bound in strips of linen with a cloth over his face, and the chief priests then plotted to kill him too, because so many believed on his account.

Which verse, famous from signs held up at sports events, comes from Jesus's night-time talk with the Pharisee Nicodemus?

John 3:16 signs became a TV fixture through Rollen Stewart, a rainbow-wigged fan who carried a portable TV to see where the cameras pointed.

Which disciple, first a follower of the Baptist, went to find his brother Simon saying 'We have found the Messiah'?

Andrew was one of two Baptist followers who trailed Jesus at the Jordan and asked where he was staying; the reply was 'Come, and you will see'.

Which disciple asked whether anything good could come from Nazareth, then heard Jesus had seen him under a fig tree?

Nathanael went from scoffing at Nazareth to declaring, 'Rabbi, you are the Son of God; you are the king of Israel.'

What new name did Jesus give Simon son of John at their first meeting, a name the text itself then translates?

Cephas, Aramaic for 'rock', turns up again in Corinth, where Paul hears that one faction of believers is saying 'I follow Cephas'.

Which Galilean town does John 1 name as the home of Philip, who then fetched a friend to meet Jesus?

Bethsaida was also the home of Simon Peter and his brother, and John 12 repeats Philip's hometown when Greeks at the festival ask him, 'Sir, we would like to see Jesus'.

Who told the servants at the wedding in John 2, 'Do whatever he tells you'?

Jesus's mother: he had just told her 'My hour has not yet come', yet six water jars were soon filled and the water became wine.

What did Jesus make from cords before driving sheep, cattle and traders from the temple, a detail only John gives?

A whip: John has him scatter the money changers' coins and tell the dove sellers, 'Stop turning my Father's house into a market!'

Jesus said he would raise a destroyed temple in three days; what did John say that temple was?

His body: the crowd scoffed that the temple had taken 46 years to build, and his disciples grasped the saying only after he rose from the dead.

What does Jesus call himself in John 15, adding that his Father prunes every fruitful branch and cuts off the barren?

The true vine: 'apart from me you can do nothing', Jesus says, and branches that do not remain in him are thrown into the fire and burned.

What did Jesus tell an invalid of 38 years at a Jerusalem pool to do?

Take up his mat: it was the Sabbath, so the Jewish leaders told the man the law forbade carrying it, and began to persecute Jesus.

In which pool did Jesus tell a man blind from birth to wash, after putting mud made with saliva on his eyes?

Siloam, which John says means 'Sent'; some Pharisees then said the healer could not be from God because he did not keep the Sabbath.

What did Jesus call himself while teaching in the Capernaum synagogue in John 6?

The bread of life discourse cost Jesus followers — John says many of his disciples 'no longer followed him' — once his talk of eating and drinking him proved too hard a teaching.

Who, John alone says, supplied the barley loaves and two small fish with which Jesus fed the 5,000?

A boy: once fed, the crowd hailed Jesus as the Prophet and meant to make him king by force, so he withdrew to a mountain alone.

What must a person be to see the kingdom of God, Jesus told Nicodemus?

Born again, or 'born from above' as the Greek can also mean, baffled Nicodemus, who asked how someone could be born when they are old.

Which object from Moses's wilderness years did Jesus compare to the lifted-up Son of Man when talking to Nicodemus?

The bronze snake kept bitten Israelites alive if they looked at it, yet King Hezekiah later smashed it because people were burning incense to it.

Which miracle did the disciples see on the lake the night after the feeding of the 5,000 in John 6?

Walking on water, in John's telling, ends with the boat 'immediately' reaching the shore, and unlike Matthew's version there is no Peter stepping out to join him.

Which episode, missing from John's oldest manuscripts, ends with 'Go now and leave your life of sin'?

The woman caught in adultery: Jesus wrote on the ground, and after 'let any one of you who is without sin' her accusers left, the older ones first.

Which Jewish festival, named nowhere else in the New Testament, finds Jesus in Solomon's Colonnade one winter?

Hanukkah, the Festival of Dedication, marks the Maccabees' rededication of the temple, and there the crowd demands that Jesus say plainly whether he is the Messiah.

How did the crowd react when Jesus said 'Before Abraham was, I am' in John 8?

They picked up stones to stone him, but Jesus hid himself and slipped away from the temple grounds.

Which sister went out to meet Jesus in John 11 and heard 'I am the resurrection and the life'?

Martha answered, 'I believe that you are the Messiah, the Son of God', much the confession Matthew gives to Peter.

Which high priest argued in John 11 that one man should die for the people rather than the whole nation perish?

Caiaphas meant it as politics, but John reads it as unwitting prophecy that Jesus would die for the nation, and from that day the council plotted to take his life.

Mary poured a pint of pure nard on Jesus's feet at Bethany; what did Judas say it was worth?

A year's wages, and John adds that Judas said it not because he cared for the poor but because he kept the common purse and helped himself to it.

What did the crowd carry out to meet Jesus at the triumphal entry in John 12, a detail the synoptics omit?

Palm branches are specified only by John, which is why the day is Palm Sunday; Matthew and Mark speak merely of branches cut from the fields or trees.

What must fall and die to produce many seeds, Jesus said when Greeks asked to see him?

A kernel of wheat, and the request of the Greek pilgrims is the cue, in John, for Jesus to declare 'The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified'.

How did Jesus identify his betrayer to the beloved disciple in John 13?

By passing him a dipped morsel, and as soon as Judas took it 'Satan entered into him'; he went out at once, 'and it was night'.

Before what, Jesus said, would Peter disown him three times, just after Peter vowed to lay down his life?

A rooster crowing, and in John 18 it crows at the instant of Peter's third denial, made while he warmed himself at a fire in the high priest's courtyard.

Which Greek term for the Holy Spirit in John 14 to 16 is rendered Advocate, Comforter or Helper in English Bibles?

Paraclete combines the Greek for 'alongside' and 'to call', and the farewell discourse promises this figure will 'remind you of everything I have said to you'.

Which high priest's servant lost his right ear to Peter's sword at the arrest, a name only John records?

Malchus: only John names him and Peter as the swordsman, and a relative of Malchus later challenged Peter in the high priest's courtyard.

Who questioned Jesus first after the arrest in John 18, before sending him bound to the high priest, his son-in-law?

Annas, a former high priest, asked about his disciples and teaching, and when Jesus replied that he had spoken openly, an official slapped him in the face.

What did the arresting party do when Jesus answered 'I am he' in the garden across the Kidron Valley?

They drew back and fell to the ground, a detail only John records, and Jesus had to ask a second time whom they wanted before telling them to let his disciples go.

Which prisoner, of whom John says only that he 'had taken part in an uprising', did the crowd choose over Jesus?

Barabbas was freed under a custom, cited by Pilate, of releasing one prisoner at Passover, and Pilate had just said he found no basis for a charge against Jesus.

What did Pilate say as he brought Jesus out wearing the crown of thorns and purple robe?

Here is the man, 'Ecce homo' in the Latin Vulgate, and at the sight of him the chief priests and officials shouted, 'Crucify! Crucify!'

What was special about the undergarment of Jesus for which the soldiers at the cross cast lots rather than tear it?

Woven in one piece from top to bottom, and John presents the lots as fulfilling the psalm 'They divided my clothes among them and cast lots for my garment'.

Why did the soldiers leave Jesus's legs unbroken, though they broke those of the two men crucified beside him?

He had already died, so a soldier pierced his side instead, and John ties the unbroken legs to the scripture 'Not one of his bones will be broken'.

Nicodemus brought myrrh and aloes to help which secret disciple lay Jesus in a tomb?

Joseph of Arimathea: afraid of the Jewish leaders, he had followed Jesus only in secret, yet he went to Pilate and took Jesus away for burial.

Whom did Mary Magdalene take the risen Jesus for when she turned from the empty tomb in John 20?

A gardener — until he said 'Mary' and she answered 'Rabboni', after which he told her 'Do not hold on to me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father'.

What did Peter do on hearing 'It is the Lord!' in John 21?

Jumped into the sea, though he first wrapped his outer garment around him, having taken it off, while the others followed in the boat towing the net.

Which creature stands for John the Evangelist in most Christian art, from the four living creatures of Ezekiel's vision?

An eagle, in the scheme Jerome adopted; in the 2nd century Irenaeus had paired John with the lion instead.

What does John's last verse say could not hold the books if all Jesus did were written down?

The whole world would not have room, the author supposes. The flourish follows his sign-off as the disciple 'who testifies to these things and who wrote them down'.

Which hymn takes its line about once being blind from the healed man in John 9?

Amazing Grace borrows the man's retort to the Pharisees, 'I was blind but now I see'. Newton, once a slave-ship captain, was using the line in his diary long before he composed the hymn.

What did Jesus offer the woman at Jacob's well in John 4, saying whoever drank it would never thirst?

Living water puzzled her: 'you have nothing to draw with and the well is deep,' she said, then asked for some so she need not keep coming back to draw.

What did Jesus do with his finger in John 8 while accusers pressed him to condemn a woman?

He wrote on the ground twice, and the text never says what. The accusers then drifted away one at a time, the older ones first, until only the woman was left.

In what form did John the Baptist say he saw the Spirit come down from heaven and remain on Jesus?

A dove was the sign he had been told to watch for: whoever the Spirit settled on would be the one to baptise with the Holy Spirit.

What compliment did the master of the banquet pay in John 2 after tasting the water turned to wine?

The best came last, he told the groom, when hosts normally bring out the choice wine first and the cheaper once guests have had too much to drink.

Which phrase opens John's Gospel, echoing the very first line of the book of Genesis?

In the beginning ties the Word to creation itself: the next lines say all things were made through him, where Genesis has God create by speaking.

What did Jesus call himself in John 8:12, a claim he repeats just before healing a man born blind?

The light of the world came with a promise: whoever follows him 'will have the light of life'. He said it while teaching in the temple courts, near the place where the offerings were put.

Which greeting does the risen Jesus give three times in John 20, first behind locked doors?

Peace be with you opens both his Easter-evening visit and his return a week later. The first time, he follows it by showing them his hands and side.

What did the risen Jesus do to the disciples in John 20 as he said, 'Receive the Holy Spirit'?

He breathed on them, then added that any sins they forgave would be forgiven. Moments earlier he had sent them out: 'As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.'

Which Aramaic word did Mary Magdalene cry out in John 20 on realising who the supposed stranger was?

Rabboni means 'Teacher', as the text explains for anyone who knew no Aramaic. It does the same for 'Rabbi' when the first two followers address Jesus in chapter 1.

Which confession did the apostle called Didymus make in John 20 on seeing the risen Jesus's wounds?

My Lord and my God came from the one apostle who had missed the first appearance and sworn he would accept nothing until he put his finger where the nails had been.

Which word did the risen Jesus use in John 20:29 for people who have faith without having seen him?

Blessed was his reply to an apostle who had demanded proof: 'Because you have seen me, you have believed.' The line looks past the people in the room to every later reader.

What reason does John 20:31 give for writing down the signs Jesus performed before his disciples?

To help readers believe that Jesus is the Messiah and 'have life in his name', the verse says. The one before admits he did many other signs that the book leaves out.

At what time of day does John 20 have Mary Magdalene reach the tomb, where Mark says 'just after sunrise'?

Before dawn is John's version: she came 'while it was still dark' and, as far as the text says, alone, where Mark has three women arriving with spices.

By which other name does John 21 call the Sea of Galilee, where the risen Jesus meets seven disciples?

Sea of Tiberias comes from the lakeside city founded in honour of the emperor Tiberius. John uses the label once before, when introducing the feeding of the five thousand.

Which exact number of large fish does John 21 say the disciples hauled ashore in an untorn net?

153 has puzzled people ever since. Augustine noted it is the sum of the whole numbers from 1 to 17, which he read as the Ten Commandments plus the seven gifts of the Spirit.

Which instruction does the risen Jesus give Simon Peter three times beside the lake in John 21?

Feed my sheep, in three slightly varied wordings, answers each of Peter's replies. The scene is widely read as his restoration after he had disowned Jesus three times.

Which rumour about the beloved disciple does John 21 correct, noting that Jesus never said it?

He would not die was the rumour among believers, after Jesus asked Peter, 'If I want him to remain alive until I return, what is that to you?' The chapter stresses that he only said 'if'.

What did Jesus say his Father's house was being turned into in John 2, where Mark has 'a den of robbers'?

A market is the charge in John, who sets the clearing of the temple at the start of the ministry, where the other three Gospels put it in the final week.

On which day did Jesus heal the invalid at the pool in John 5, turning Jewish leaders against him?

The Sabbath turned a healing into a charge of law-breaking. His defence only raised the stakes: 'My Father is always at his work to this very day, and I too am working.'

Which Jerusalem pool, ringed by five covered colonnades, sees a long-term invalid healed in John 5?

Bethesda left no clear archaeological trace until the 19th century, when digs beside St Anne's Church in Jerusalem found a large tank; the site plausibly fits John's description.

Who, according to John 7, had no faith in Jesus even as they urged him to go public in Judea?

His own brothers pressed him to show himself at a Judean festival. He sent them on ahead, then followed quietly, 'not publicly, but in secret'.

From which town did some in the John 7 crowd insist the Messiah must come, doubting a Galilean?

Bethlehem was the crowd's objection: 'How can the Messiah come from Galilee?' John, which has no birth story, leaves the question hanging.

Whom did Jesus call 'a liar and the father of lies' while arguing with opponents in John 8?

The devil, he said, was the real father of the people plotting to kill him, though they claimed Abraham. When the devil lies, 'he speaks his native language'.

Whose sin, besides the man's own, did the disciples suggest in John 9 had left him born blind?

His parents' sin or his own was the disciples' either-or. Jesus rejected both: 'this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him.'

What did the healed man's mother and father fear in John 9 when they said, 'He is of age; ask him'?

Synagogue expulsion was already the agreed penalty for anyone who acknowledged Jesus as the Messiah. Their son stood firm under questioning and was thrown out.

Whose dying son did Jesus heal from a distance in John 4, the second sign he performed in Galilee?

A royal official's son, lying sick in Capernaum, recovered at the very hour Jesus said 'Your son will live'. The father checked the time with his servants on the road home.

Near which town, beside a plot Jacob gave one of his sons, does John 4 set Jesus's talk at a well?

Sychar's townspeople, stirred by the woman's story, came out to meet Jesus and urged him to stay. He remained two days, and many of them believed.

Which part of a sheepfold does Jesus call himself in John 10, in a speech against 'thieves and robbers'?

The gate, or 'the door' in older Bibles, is one of the Gospel's 'I am' sayings: whoever enters through him, he says, 'will be saved'.

Which meal did the risen Jesus serve seven disciples beside a fire of burning coals in John 21?

Breakfast was fish grilled on the shore, eaten after a night in which the men had caught nothing. No one dared ask the stranger who he was: 'They knew it was the Lord.'

What did Judas Iscariot keep for the disciples in John 12, while helping himself to what was in it?

The money bag made him the group's treasurer, and John calls him a thief. That is the Gospel's verdict on his protest that Mary's perfume should have been sold for the poor.

Which shout did the festival crowd raise in John 12 as Jesus rode into Jerusalem on a young donkey?

Hosanna rang out from pilgrims in town for the festival, who hailed him as 'the king of Israel'. John admits the disciples only understood the scene afterwards.

What did some bystanders in John 12 think they had heard when a voice from heaven answered Jesus's prayer?

Thunder was one guess; others in the crowd said an angel had spoken to him. Jesus told them the voice had come 'for your benefit, not mine'.

What does Jesus say his Father's house has many of in John 14, as he promises to prepare a place?

Rooms, or 'mansions' in the King James Version, are his reassurance to anxious disciples at the supper: he is going ahead and will come back to take them with him.

What does Jesus now call his disciples in John 15, instead of servants, having told them everything?

Friends, he explains, are told the master's business, where a servant is not. Moments earlier he had defined the greatest love as laying down one's life for them.

Which everyday experience does Jesus use in John 16 to picture his disciples' grief turning into joy?

A woman giving birth forgets her anguish, he says, once the child has arrived. So the disciples' grief at losing him would give way to a joy no one could take from them.

What does the crowd in John 10 say John the Baptist never did, though all he said about Jesus proved true?

Worked a miracle, or a 'sign' in John's wording, is the one thing the crowd beyond the Jordan said he never did. The prologue casts him the same way, as a man who 'came only as a witness'.

Which wedding role did John the Baptist claim in John 3, saying of Jesus 'He must become greater'?

The bridegroom's friend 'is full of joy when he hears the bridegroom's voice', the Baptist said when told that the crowds were now leaving him for Jesus.

What do scholars call the long after-supper speech Jesus gives his disciples across John 14 to 17?

The Farewell Discourse is addressed to the eleven disciples who remain once Judas has gone out into the night, and it closes with a chapter-long prayer.

Which act, frequent in Mark's account of Jesus, is missing altogether from John's Gospel?

Casting out demons is never mentioned in John. The Gospel also leaves out the Sermon on the Mount, the transfiguration and the story of Jesus's birth.

Who was the father of the apostle John, the fisherman long credited with writing the fourth Gospel?

Zebedee fished the Sea of Galilee with his sons James and John. When Jesus called the brothers, Mark says, they left him in the boat with the hired men and followed.

Which annual festival comes round three times in John, the basis for giving Jesus a three-year ministry?

Passover arrives in chapter 2, when Jesus clears the temple, again in chapter 6, and finally in the week of his death.

Which German composer set John's account of the trial and crucifixion to music for Good Friday in Leipzig?

J. S. Bach composed the St John Passion in his first year as Leipzig's director of church music. It was first heard at Good Friday vespers in St Nicholas Church in 1724.

In which city, where tradition says John spent his old age, was the fourth Gospel probably written?

Ephesus is where Irenaeus placed John, remaining with its church 'until the times of Trajan'. A basilica there was later built over the tomb said to be his.

Which Hebrew word does Jesus double before solemn sayings in John, the King James Bible's 'Verily, verily'?

Amen usually closes a prayer, but Jesus uses it to open a statement, as 'truly'. Only in John's Gospel does he say it twice over.

Which Latin title of a Correggio painting quotes the risen Jesus's words to Mary Magdalene in John 20?

Noli me tangere, 'touch me not', is the Latin Bible's version of the line. The moment she recognises him has been painted continuously since Late Antiquity.

What does John 20 note about the cloth from Jesus's head, seen by Peter inside the tomb?

It lay on its own, 'separate from the linen'. The other disciple, who had outrun Peter but waited at the entrance, then went in too: 'He saw and believed.'

Which English city holds P52, a scrap of John 18 widely held to be the earliest New Testament text?

Manchester's fragment is about the size of a credit card, with lines from Jesus's trial before Pilate on both sides, which shows it came from a bound book rather than a scroll.

How did Jesus first describe the dead man of Bethany to his disciples in John 11, who took him literally?

He had fallen asleep, Jesus said, and he was going to wake him. The disciples thought that sounded like good news for a sick man, so he told them plainly that the man was dead.