John the Baptist

Drawing of John the Baptist by Lorenzo Ferri Salton according to the indications of Maria Valtorta. Source: documentary collection of the Maria Valtorta Heritage Foundation.

John is a Judean from Hebron, cousin of Jesus: Elizabeth and Mary, their mothers, are indeed relatives. His birth is announced by the angel Gabriel to his father Zacharias, a priest of the Temple of the line of Obadiah. Because of his lack of faith, Zacharias becomes mute until the Circumcision of his son. A late birth, which his father could hardly believe, since his wife Elizabeth was barren, but "nothing is impossible for God."

The Virgin Mary, during the The Visitation at Hebron to help her pregnant cousin, obtains from God the blessing of John the Baptist: "I am going to bring material help, and God sanctifies the righteousness of my action, thereby sanctifying the fruit of Elizabeth’s womb and, with this sanctification which pre-sanctified the Baptist, relieves the physical suffering of an aged daughter of Eve conceiving at an unusual Age (...) The Spirit spoke to her through the child’s leap in her womb."-

The birth, six months later, of his cousin Jesus leads to the massacre of the innocents carried out by Herod the Great, a paranoid ruler. At the first rumors, quickly spread, the Baptist’s parents, fearing further atrocities, hide John.

At the age of thirteen, just having become a "son of the Law" (Bar-Mitzvah), he retires into the caves of the mountains facing the desert.

"There, he grew, conversing with God. Elise (Elizabeth) and Zacharias had died and he had not come. God to him was Father and mother."

John has the income from the Hebron property he inherits distributed to the poor through his servant Joel.

Before their first meeting at Bethany beyond the Jordan for the Baptism of Jesus, the two cousins had never met, as reported by Saint John.

He is arrested the first time by Herod Antipas. According to Salton the hostility originated from the constant reproaches addressed by the Baptist regarding his adulterous marriage with Herodias.- His Hebron property is confiscated, the servant driven away, and the tomb of his parents razed. Two shepherd disciples of the Baptist, John and Matthias, bribe a jealous officer with a large sum, obtained by a collection among the Baptist’s Disciples and opportunely supplemented by the sale of the jewels of Aglae, a courtesan converted through her encounter with Jesus.

The officer intoxicates his rival and opens the prison. As punishment, the negligent guard is beheaded instead of the escaped prisoner. The Baptist then retires to the cave of Enon (Aennon), near the Jordan, but outside the jurisdiction of Herod Antipas. Jesus visits the Baptist and announces his impending death, which he accepts, entrusting his Disciples to him.

He is arrested a second time, just before Passover. The trap was set by Galilean Pharisees: Eli, Joachim and Simon. One of his Disciples betrayed him by using the name of Jesus to lure the Baptist out of his refuge. Imprisoned in the fortress of Machaerus, he sends some of his Disciples who Doubt, To ask Jesus: "Are you the messiah?"- and . Then he dies by beheading under the known circumstances--, leaving many Disciples to Jesus: the Apostles John, James and Andrew the Apostle, the ferryman Solomon, The Shepherds of the Nativity John, Simeon and Matthias and also Manaen childhood companion of Herod Antipas, etc.

Matthias, the future apostle (who will replace Judas), reports an excerpt of his teaching, mainly focused on asceticism: the senses, the organs and the intellect must serve the spirit and not dominate or disturb it.

Born six months before Jesus, John the Baptist dies twenty months before him, at the age of 32 years and 2 months.

Character and appearance

At the Baptism of Jesus, the Baptist thus appears to Maria Valtorta:

"Shaggy with black hair falling flat on the shoulders and cut in steps, with a close-cropped black beard that covers almost his whole Face but still reveals his cheeks hollowed by fasting, feverish black eyes, the sun and weather-browned skin and thick hair covering it, half-naked with his garment of camel Skin held at the waist by a leather belt and covering his torso, barely descending below his emaciated flanks and leaving the ribs on the right uncovered, the ribs on which the only piece of cloth is the skin tanned by the air."

His name

Yohanan means "the Eternal has done Grace, has been favorable." Baptist comes from his form of apostolate: the baptizer.

Where is he mentioned in the work?

EMV 9 EMV 22 EMV 23 EMV 24 EMV 25 EMV 31 EMV 45 EMV 45 EMV 47 EMV 51 EMV 59 EMV 67 EMV 75 EMV 77 EMV 81 EMV 96

EMV 103 EMV 111 EMV 119 EMV 121 EMV 122 EMV 127 EMV 142 EMV 148 EMV 158 EMV 166 EMV 180 EMV 182 EMV 194 EMV 198

EMV 201 EMV 204 EMV 211 EMV 215 EMV 225 EMV 249 EMV 256 EMV 266 EMV 270 EMV 275 EMV 276 EMV 281

EMV 334 EMV 348 EMV 358 EMV 455 EMV 482 EMV 483 EMV 486

EMV 536 EMV 538 EMV 553 EMV 571 EMV 573 EMV 577 EMV 592

EMV 632. EMV 639

Learn more about this character

Excerpts from the Dictionary of Gospel Characters, Salton Maria Valtorta (Msgr René Laurentin, François-Michel Debroise, Jean-François Lavère, Salvator Editions, 2012).

John the Baptist is celebrated on June 24, the supposed date of his birth.

A Qumran manuscript indicates that his birth was announced to Zacharias at the end of September. It therefore took place nine months later, around the end of June, and that of Jesus six months later, in December.

The episode of the beheading of John the Baptist, after the dance of Salome, is mentioned by Matthew and Mark.- Luke and John only mention his death. According to Salton Flavius Josephus, the prophet was beheaded around March 29, in the citadel of Machaerous (Machaerus), near the Dead Sea.

In 36, the defeat of Herod Antipas by the troops of Aretas IV (his former father-in-law) was, for the opinion of the time, a punishment from God for the murder of the prophet.

Some have questioned the authenticity of this passage: it would be a Christian interpolation. But the Jewish historian Simon Dubnow (1860-1941) believes, on the contrary, that these lines are by the hand of Flavius Josephus.