# John 6 versus John 17 - Was Judas one of the elect???



## luvroftheWord

John 6:37-40--
[i:ae496b29ec]All that the Father gives me[/i:ae496b29ec] will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never cast out. For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will but the will of him who sent me. And this is the will of him who sent me, that [i:ae496b29ec]I should lose nothing of all that he has given me[/i:ae496b29ec], but raise it up on the last day. For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.

John 17:11-12--
And I am no longer in the world, but they are in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, keep them in your name, [i:ae496b29ec]which you have given me[/i:ae496b29ec], that they may be one, even as we are one. While I was with them, I kept them in your name, [i:ae496b29ec]which you have given me[/i:ae496b29ec]. I have guarded them, and not one of them has been lost [i:ae496b29ec]except the son of destruction[/i:ae496b29ec], that the Scripture might be fulfilled.


How should we reconcile these passages? The first one says that it is the Father's will that Jesus lose none of what the Father has given him. But the second says that none of what Jesus had been given by the Father had been lost, EXCEPT the son of destruction.

Or I guess a better way to put it is like this: Was Judas Iscariot one of those given to the Son by the Father?

I plan to do some exegetical work in the Greek of these passages in the next couple of days, but for now I wanted to lay the question out on the table for everyone else's comments and ideas. I'm sure you can see the implications this question has for the traditional Calvinistic understanding of John 6. What do you guys think is going on in these passages?


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## pastorway

If He loses nothing that has been given to Him and He lost Judas, then Judas was not given to Him!

You need to consider in your study what the phrase &quot;given to&quot; means in both chapters. The disciples were &quot;given to&quot; Christ as His followers, but obviously, Judas proves that they were not all &quot;given to&quot; Him salvifically!

Phillip


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## py3ak

Coincidentally, James White dealt with this very objection a few days ago. Here is the link
http://www.aomin.org/PFRSJohn6.html


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## fredtgreco

Judas was not one of the elect. He was the type par excellence of the rebrobate. Thus Calvin:

[quote:f128882bfc]Whom thou hast given me. He again employs the same argument, that it would be highly unbecoming that the Father should reject those whom his Son, by his command, has hept to the very close of his ministry; as if he had said, &quot;What thou didst commit to me I have faithfully executed, and I took care that nothing was lost in my hands; and when thou now receivest what thou hadst intrusted to me, it belongs to thee to see that it continue to be safe and sound.&quot;

But the son of perdition. Judas is excepted, and not without reason; for, though he was not one of the elect and of the true flock of God, yet the dignity of his office gave him the appearance of it; and, indeed, no one would have formed a different opinion of him, so long as he held that exalted rank. Tried by the rules of grammar, the exception is incorrect; but if we examine the matter narrowly, it was necessary that Christ should speak thus, in accommodation to the ordinary opinion of men. But, that no one might think that the eternal election of God was overturned by the damnation of Judas, he immediately added, that he was the son of perdition. By these words Christ means that his ruin, which took place suddenly before the eyes of men, had been known to God long before; for the son of perdition, according to the Hebrew idiom, denotes a man who is ruined, or devoted to destruction.[/quote:f128882bfc]


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## luvroftheWord

I guess part of what I'm wondering is if the idea of the Father giving a people to the Son is idiomatic in John's gospel.


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## fredtgreco

[quote:86d1c91847][i:86d1c91847]Originally posted by luvroftheWord[/i:86d1c91847]
I guess part of what I'm wondering is if the idea of the Father giving a people to the Son is idiomatic in John's gospel. [/quote:86d1c91847]

I don't understand what you mean. Explain &quot;idiomatic&quot; in this context.


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## luvroftheWord

What I mean is that I am wondering if the phraseology of &quot;the Father gives the Son&quot; and its variants has an understood meaning in John's gospel, and because the meaning is understood, it should be understood the same way in every occurance. Like, example, the phrase &quot;son of perdition&quot; or &quot;son of destruction&quot;, which also occurs in John 17. This is a Hebrew idiom that means the same thing in every occurance. Of course, you could argue that our understanding of this phrase in John 17 as being the one who was destined to betray Christ is determined not by the understood meaning of the phrase itself, but because the text qualifies the phrase with the statement, &quot;that the Scripture might be fulfilled.&quot; Now, this explanation does reinforce our understanding of what &quot;son of perdition&quot; means in John 17, but I would argue that the Jews would know what the phrase &quot;son of perdition&quot; meant even without the further explanation because it was a common Hebrew idiom.

Do you understand what I mean?


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