This examination is not a biography of the man but an investigation of the legends that grew around him. Beginning with New Testament reports of John as fisherman and extending through the most recent Johannine scholarship, Culpepper gathers stories from church fathers, the apocryphal acts of John, medieval sources, Victorian poets, and 19th- and 20th-century historians about the exploits and the death of the apostle.

R. Alan Culpepper is Professor of Religion at McAfee School of Theology, Atlanta, and one of the leaders in Gospel of John research.