86. I cannot agree with Weiss (u. s., p. 122) that the great object of the fourth Gospel was to oppose the
rising Gnostic movement, This may have been present to the Apostle's mind, as evidenced in his
Epistle, but the object in view could not have been mainly, nor even primarily, negative and
controversial.
Philo had no successor. In him Hellenism had completed its cycle. Its message and its mission
were ended. Henceforth it needed, like Apollos, its great representative in the Christian Church,
two things: the baptism of John to the knowledge of sin and need, and to have the way of God
more perfectly expounded.87 On the other hand, Eastern Judaism had entered with Hillel on a
new stage. This direction led farther and farther away from that which the New Testament had
taken in following up and unfolding the spiritual elements of the Old. That development was
incapable of transformation or renovation. It must go on to its final completion, and be either
true, or else be swept away and destroyed.
87. Acts xviii 24-28