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Saint John the Baptist, painted by Leonardo da Vinci (c. 1513–1516), Louvre, Paris
Saint John the Baptist, painted by Leonardo da Vinci (c. 1513–1516), Louvre, Paris

Leonardo da Vinci · Public domain · Source

Person

John the Baptist

Also called: Saint John the Baptist, John the Baptizer

Jewish prophet who baptised people in the Jordan as a sign of repentance; he baptised Jesus and was executed by the tetrarch Herod Antipas (Josephus and the Gospels)

Luke’s Gospel makes him the son of the priest Zechariah and Elizabeth and a kinsman of Jesus. Dressed in camel hair and living on locusts and wild honey in the Judaean wilderness, he called on people to repent because God’s judgement was near, and baptised them in the Jordan; Jesus too was baptised by him. He was arrested after denouncing the tetrarch Herod Antipas for marrying Herodias, his brother’s wife, and Josephus writes that Herod, fearing his influence, had him executed at the fortress of Machaerus. The Gospels say that Herodias’ daughter (Salome in later tradition) asked for his head as the reward for her dance.

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1 related event

  1. 1
    AD 28Baptism of Jesuskey figure

    Around AD 28 Jesus was baptised by John the Baptist in the Jordan and began his public ministry. All the Gospels tell of it, and John also appears in the Jewish historian Josephus, so scholars count it as historical.

People who appear alongside

  • Jesus4 BC – AD 30

    The central figure of Christianity, who preached God’s love and salvation in Roman-ruled Palestine and was crucified in Jerusalem around AD 30

Themes this person appears in

  • Greece and Rome2000 BC – AD 476

    From the Aegean civilisation to the fall of the Western Roman Empire — the classical civilisation built by the democracy of the polis and the Roman republic and empire