2.1.
Friends as Subordinates
In this section, we will examine how the farewell discourse
communicates that the disciples are to be subordinates
of Jesus, not equals. First, the content
leading up to Jesus’s sayings about friends support the notion that the
disciples are his subordinates. While Jesus violates the expectations of
teacher-disciple relations by washing his disciples’ feet, his subsequent
exhortations point to a persistently unequal relationship. Jesus declares that
it is right to call him διδάσκαλος
(Teacher) and κύριος
(Lord, 13:13) and that slaves are not greater than their master (13:16). He
then charges them a new commandment to obey: love one another (13:35). As he
promises the Spirit (14:16–17), Jesus declares numerous times that loving him
is demonstrated by keeping his commands (14:15, 21, 23–24). In John 15, Jesus
continues the exhortation to obedience through the imagery of the vine and the
branches. The disciples are extensions of Jesus as branches off the vine; they
are not his equals. Jesus reiterates the centrality of obedience by declaring
that keeping his commands is abiding in his love. Viewing the usage of φίλοι on the lips of Jesus as referring to equals would contradict the repeated
references to obedience and subordination throughout the content leading up to
John 15:13–16.
Second, the content of John 15 points to reciprocity and obligation.
In the imagery of the vine and branches, the disciples are dependent on Jesus: apart from him they can do nothing
(15:5). Jesus declares that he will lay down his life for his friends (15:13)
and that they are his friends if (ἐάν)
they obey his commands. He assigns them a task—to bear fruit. In return, they
will receive what they ask for from the Father (15:16). The conditional
statement in verse 16 denotes a cause-and-effect relationship that signals
reciprocity. Thus, the notion of friendship in John 15, while involving
fondness, also involves roles and responsibilities between those in the
relationship.
Third, in John 15:14, Jesus states that obedience is required to be his friends: You are my friends if you do what I command you. While some
attempt to dismiss the possibility that the disciples’ status as friends of
Jesus is dependent on their obedience, the syntax of the saying suggests that
the designation is indeed conditional. The construction of the conjunction ἐάν with a verb in the present tense
consistently communicates a conditional clause in the Gospel of John,
regardless of the ordering of the clauses (see John 3:2; 5:19; 7:51). Thus, in
the context of John 15, Jesus defines friendship with obedience as a condition.
Barrett declares about this passage, “It is clear that the status of friend is
not one which precludes obedient service; this is rather demanded.”
If the exegete can suspend the notion that friendship necessitates a
relationship of equals, the use of φίλοι as clients better fits this
context. The elements of an asymmetrical relationship and reciprocity are
prominent in this passage. Indeed, Saller declares, “Where the term amicus occurs with respect to a
friendship between men known to be of unequal status, we can assume a patronage
relationship.” When one is brought into a patron-client relationship as a
result of an act of benefit, the recipients respond with loyalty, ready to
carry out duties to the patron in gratitude.
While Aristotle’s teachings epitomized the Hellenistic ideal of
friendship being characterized by social equals, the emergence of patron-client
relationships in the Roman Empire shifted the public understanding of
friendship. As a whole, the farewell discourse paints a picture of subordination, not equality.
Subordination is more consistent with the usage of φίλος in Roman patron-client relationships than
with Greek or modern western ideals of friendship. (Daniel K. Eng, “’I
Call You Friends’: Jesus as Patron in John 15,” Themelios 46, no. 1 [2021]:
58-59, emphasis in bold added)
