On completing His thirtieth year He suffered, being in fact still a young man, and who had by no means attained to advanced age. Now, that the first stage of early life embraces thirty years, and that this extends onwards to the fortieth year, every one will admit; but from the fortieth and fiftieth year a man begins to decline towards old age, which our Lord possessed while He still fulfilled the office of a Teacher, even as the Gospel and all the elders testify; those who were conversant in Asia with John, the disciple of the Lord, [affirming] that John conveyed to them that information. And he remained among them up to the times of Trajan. Some of them, moreover, saw not only John, but the other apostles also, and heard the very same account from them, and bear testimony as to the [validity of] the statement. Whom then should we rather believe? Whether such men as these, or Ptolemaeus, who never saw the apostles, and who never even in his dreams attained to the slightest trace of an apostle?

5 – شهادة الآباء الرسوليين .

يقول النصارى أن الآباء القدماء للكنيسة استشهدوا بإنجيل يوحنا كثيراً واقتبسوا منه ، وهذا يدل على أنه كان معروفاً بينهم ، ومن بين هؤلاء الآباء :

(1)- إكليمندس الروماني (95م) : والذي نجد في رسالته إلى كورنثوس أربعة نصوص متأثرة بصورة واضحة بآيات الإنجيل للقديس يوحنا :

"يتمجد اسم الرب الحقيقي الوحيد " (1:43) مع (يو28:12) " أيها الآب مجد أسمك " (يو3:17) " أنت الإله الحقيقي وحدك "