Free Study Guide IncludedJohn: A Friends Illuminated Commentary
The theological cornerstone of Quakerism. John's Gospel gave Friends their central doctrine: "the true Light which lighteth every man" — the Inner Light that became the defining conviction of the entire movement.
- 21 chapters · ~65,000 words
- EPUB + Study Guide
This edition
Read itE-book · EPUB
- Time to read4.4 hours
- Length62,521 words
- Files1 EPUB, DRM-free
How we get 4.4 hours
This figure is here so you can compare one book against another. Every title on the site is timed from its own word count at the same reading speed — nothing is adjusted book by book — so if this edition says 4.4 hours and another says half that, the second one really is about half the reading. It is a measure of size, in the way a page count is. Your own pace is your own: at the speeds typical adult readers actually manage, this edition runs anywhere from 3.5 hours to 6 hours.
What is in this edition
| Modernized text | 62,521 words |
|---|---|
| Total | 62,521 words |
Counted from the text of the EPUB you receive. Navigation, the title page, the table of contents and the licence page are excluded — they are packaging, not reading.
The reading rate
238 words per minute, for adult silent reading of non-fiction, applied unchanged to every title on the site. We did not pick the number; it is the pooled result of a published meta-analysis. Nothing is adjusted book by book — that consistency is what makes two of these figures worth comparing.
Brysbaert, M. (2019). How many words do we read per minute? A review and meta-analysis of reading rate. Journal of Memory and Language, 109, 104047. doi:10.1016/j.jml.2019.104047
190 studies, 18,573 participants.
The same paper puts most adult readers between 175 and
300 words per minute, and those two speeds give the
3.5 hours and 6 hours above.
Because time is words divided by speed, an even range of speeds produces an
uneven range of times, so 4.4 hours sits nearer the fast end of that
range than the middle of it.
If it were a paperback
Roughly 179–250 pages.
Words per printed page is a typesetting convention, not a measurement — it moves with trim size, type size and leading. The range above assumes 250–350 words a page. Friends Illuminated publishes no print edition of this book; the figure is here only because pages are a more familiar size than words.
- Secure checkout by Stripe
- Instant download
- 7-day money-back guarantee
About This Edition
If there is a single verse on which the entire edifice of Quaker theology rests, it is John 1:9: “That was the true Light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.” George Fox came to this verse early and returned to it constantly. It grounded his conviction that Christ is present in every human being, not merely in those who have heard the gospel externally, and that ministry’s task is not to bring Christ to people but to turn them toward the Light already within them. Robert Barclay built the systematic theology of his Apology on this foundation. Isaac Penington explored its depths in some of his most searching mystical writings. The doctrine of the Inner Light is John’s doctrine.
This commentary is the theological center of the Friends Illuminated series. It traces the Quaker reading of John through the entire Gospel: the Prologue with its cosmic vision of the Logos as light and life, the extended dialogues with Nicodemus and the Samaritan woman about spiritual rebirth and living water, the Farewell Discourses with their promise of the Paraclete who will lead believers into all truth, and the resurrection appearances that first-generation Friends read as present spiritual experience. The free Group Study Guide makes this commentary accessible for every level of reader.
