It may be taken for granted that the spirit–paraclete sayings belonged to the Fourth Gospel at the time of its publication, but this does not of itself prove that they were composed and inserted by the Evangelist himself. Literary study shows that there are various strands in the Gospel and there are some obvious signs of editorial activity.

Thus 21: 24 f. seem to be intended to identify the author of the book with ‘the disciple whom Jesus loved’, one of the immediate witnesses of the historic ministry (cf. 21: 20–3). Other tell-tale indications may be seen at 4: 2 and 19: 35. We need not here attempt any full explanation of these facts. A convenient short treatment is available in Willi Marxsen's Introduction to the New Testament, pp. 254–8. He holds that ‘by means of “correctional” interpolations the “Church redaction” tried to make the original work fit’ traditional Christian conceptions about eschatology, the Sacraments, and the leadership of St Peter. Within the last century it has also been thought that the spirit–paraclete texts had been interpolated: one of the more significant arguments for this view was that of H. Windisch in the Festschrift für A, Jülicher (1927). More recently the distinguished French Catholic scholar, M.-E. Boismard, has identified the editor of the Fourth Gospel as Luke the Evangelist.