| Summary: | In the history of reception of the Epistles of John, no scholar has yet to propose any universally accepted tradition of authorship or date of composition. The writing of 2 John (and, credibly, 1 John), I argue, was the product of the last decade of the second century by proto-orthodox Christian apologists who campaigned not only to offset the rising influences of their opponents but to expunge them from Christianity. The process extended over decades of intra-Christian tensions and christological debates. The anti-heretical movement in the second half of the second century and the early third century targets Marcion and Montanus, whose ideas are directly countered by a number of theological statements in 2 John and 1 John. Yet there is no trace of the reception of 3 John in extant records until the first half of the fourth century, when the epistle is suddenly and mysteriously collated in א and B.
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